fromage fort
Step 1. Host a party
Step 1a. Buy cheese for the party. Be sure to buy more cheese than you expect to be consumed.
Step 1b. Encourage guests to help themselves to the cheese. Be sure that you paid attention to 1a.
Step 1c. Finish the party, make sure your guests are in a good state to get home and won't come back for a few days.
Step 1d. If opened bottles of white wine exist, save these. Drink water.
Step 1e. Go to bed.
Step 2. Wake up the following morning.
Step 2a. Take leftover cheese, peel off and discard rinds, slice into small chunks. Toss into food processor or blender
Step 3. Add white wine from last night, or vermouth if need be. 1/4 cup liquid per pound of cheese should be fine to start with. You might need more depending on firmness of your cheeses.
Step 4. Add a clove of garlic.
Step 5. Add a couple of tablespoons of butter.
Step 6. Start some toast
Step 7. Blend the cheese, wine and garlic until smooth.
Step 8. Spread on toast.
This particular fromage fort was composed of a half pound of some three week old supermarket chevre, slivers of Comte and Landaff, a bit of Asiago and remainders of Bayley Hazen Blue and Humboldt Fog. The liquid included bits of Noilly Prat and Lillet. I was hoping to use champagne, but that didn't survive New Year's. Ah well, it died for a good cause.
If there is one thing I hope to do more of in 2011, it's making do what I have rather than buying something else. The last few years have seen their share of capital investments. New bike. Upgrade camping gear. Replace the car. I look at everything that we've acquired over the past few years and I like to think that it's enough. That we're good. That we're set.
Entropy happens. Things break. Everything else, though, is good enough.