This is my favorite au gratin recipe, but this is not for the faint of heart (figuratively and medically). Here are the characters you would need for this sinful potatoes, listed in the order of calorificness…

I guess I forgot to take a picture of the main character ….the potatoes! Peel 4 russet potatoes and slice as thinly as you can. If you have a mandolin, use it. I can’t caution you enough. I have seen so many mishaps from that thing in the clinic. All I can say is, a potato cost like 35 cents. You don’t have to cut it to the nub at the risk of cutting your fingers with it…eeeewwww.

Back to the yummy stuff. Arrange the potatoes in a baking dish. I use Le Creuset. During the holidays, it goes on sale and its really worth the price. Clean-up is so easy and for as long as you don’t break it, its very durable too. I have had some less reputable baking dishes that have cracked in the oven. So messy!

Arrange slices potatoes flat, into layers.

As I mentioned earlier, the weather in Texas has really been insane. It was high 70’s on Christmas Day! I mean, it hardly ever snows in Texas,  but people were wearing shorts and flip-flops whilst doing holiday shopping! It was unnerving. Anyway, I woke up today and its finally cold. It was 39, with a low of 22. Found out that it only applies to Fredericksburg and the Hill Country areas in general. The rest of Texas, specially Houston and south, south-east, still have not gotten the memo that winter has started since last week.

It was perfect day to laze around the house. We had a nice coffee by the fireplace and basically had no plans but to chill for the rest of the day. For lunch I decided to dish out my Christmas left-overs and noted that I still had some opened cheese. It’s fondue time!

I usually make my fondue using three cheeses in equal parts: gruyere, gouda and emmental. I didn’t have emmental in my fridge so I opted for blue cheese instead. for wine, Ideally, it should be Sauvignon Blanc. I chugged the last drop last night so I had to use Cuvee Blanc.

Grate the cheeses as finely as humanly possible before dropping them to the simmering wine. You can add 1 T butter and 2T of flour just to keep it from getting too sticky. I won’t be needing that for this batch because I am using blue cheese which tend to be runny when heated. Mix well until all the cheese melts. By the way, a fondue pot is ideal, but in this case, my fondue pot is back at the Beast (main house) so I’m using a double boiler. If you don’t have that either, make sure you stir the pot constantly to prevent it from sticking in the bottom.

As you can see, we’ve really been “roughing” it in Fredericksburg. I’m using barbecue skewers in lieu of my fondue skewers that  I left at home. It serves the purpose. After some gulps of the perfectly warmed gluhwein, everything seem right again!