Raclette

“Raclette” refers to both a cheese and a dish. Since the word derives from racler, meaning to scrape—what you do when serving the dish—it seems that the name of the dish must have preceded that of the cheese. To serve raclette the traditional way, take a large wedge of raclette cheese or some other variety (see variations to Untraditional Raclette) and set it close to a hot wood fire in a hearth. (I set mine on a small stack of bricks, the top one wrapped in aluminum foil.) As the surface of the cheese facing the flames begins to melt, scrape against the surface with a spatula or the back of a knife while holding a heated plate under the cheese. Served the melted cheese over boiled or steamed new potatoes in their skins and pass French sour gherkins—cornichons—as an accompaniment. If you don’t have a fireplace or don’t feel like building a big, hot fire in order to cook dinner, you can use an electric raclette maker (see Sources) or you can melt the cheese in the oven. Madeleine Kamman, in her delightful book Madeleine Kamman’s Savoie, describes a version in which the potatoes are diced and cooked in butter, cream is poured over the potatoes in a gratin dish, and the slices of raclette are placed on top. The whole thing is then baked in the oven until the cheese melts. It’s a marvelous interpretation, but the ritual of sitting around, taking turns scraping, is lost.