Cheese fondue.
So we start with the wine, a sauvignon blanc
is what I've chosen today.
You don't want a wine
that has any oak to the flavor whatsoever.
You want something that's crisp and light.
So, souvignon blanc, I think,
works perfect for this.
To the cup and a half in my fondue pot,
we simmer that wine very gently.
I've got it over very moderate heat.
This is on between medium-low and medium.
It's just coming up to a gentle simmer
with two cloves of pasted garlic.
So you can either mince it,
add salt, and mash it with your knife back and forth,
or you can use the fine side of your grater.
So to the two cloves of garlic
and the cup and a half of wine,
I added about a teaspoon and 1/2 of lemon juice,
a nice squirt from a small lemon,
half of a small lemon.
You're going to lace it with a touch of brandy,
about a tablespoon and 1/2, or a small splash of brandy.
We're also going to add two teaspoons
of good dijon mustard.
That's going to go into the sauce
and then we're gonna melt down our cheeses.
You need three cups of cheese.
We have fontina, gouda, and gruyere.
Then we're going to add a couple tablespoons
of corn starch to help stabilize the cheese sauce
as it's thickening.
Then I just gently toss that to combine it with the cheese.
Now we're going to add the cheese slowly, in small bunches,
and just work with a wooden spoon
to melt the cheese into a smooth, silky sauce.
And then I add a little bit of nutmeg and white pepper,
and you're basically done.
You get a cast iron skillet for our proteins,
I have cooked up steaks, some cubed sirloin tip steak
in this pan with lots of salt and pepper,
and a little splash of wine or stock
to lift up the drippings.
And then we're going to pile that into a little bowl
and start piling it around
our cheese fondue pot.
I took whole cremini mushrooms,
or baby portabello mushrooms, right?
We brown them completely until they get super meaty.
Once they have cooked fully
and gotten to a nice, pretty, reddish-brown,
gorgeous color like this, that's when we add salt.
Then we're going to add thyme, salt and pepper.
Take this off of the flame so you do not flame the bottle,
and add a little brandy,
and add a little brandy to the pan.
Don't freak out if the pan catches fire,
it'll go out in a couple of seconds
after the alcohol burns off.
Back here, I took pearl onions, fresh,
you boil them, give them a squish,
cut the end off, give 'em a squish,
pop 'em out, or you can buy frozen pearl onions.
And I cook mine in a little bit of butter
with a sprinkle of sugar and a sprinkle of salt.
Then I add to that, just before service,
just a little bit of chopped parsley.
I'm gonna put the onions next to the potatoes.
We have baby potatoes.
They're still nice and piping hot.
And now we're going to do some French sausages.
You start your sausage in a little bit of water.
Let the water evaporate,
and then you brown the casings up.
For all of your veg, you're going to put some,
in this case, some beautiful broccolini,
the tops of our broccolini,
into your boiling water,
and you let that cook for about 90 seconds
for all of your veg,
like we already did asparagus and cauliflower,
and then you're gonna plunge it
into a cold ice-water bath,
and dry them out,
and arrange them in a beautiful pattern
on your cutting boards.
My stunt toasters, Jeanette's my most famous stunt toaster,
they made a selection of torn pieces of sourdough,
rustic white and whole grain,
so you've got big chunks of bread
that I'm gonna put next to our fondue.
At home, I would put out pickled vegetables too.
I love pickled vegetables and fondue.
But today we have broccolini, radishes, tomatoes, asparagus.
The asparagus was especially woody and kind of huge,
so we just trimmed that down a bit
with the vegetable peeler.
Again, this has been blanched,
see how it improves the color and the eye appeal?
And it really does improve the flavor too.
And it gets a little salt from the salted water as well,
and our cauliflowers here.
And then you just get your dip on.
Look at that, like, come on.
(audience applauds)