This is just the apero for Christmas Eve dinner, the main course was still to come. Angelina loved the foie gras, like Mommy.
Fredo claims this is just his family, but from hearing around it sounds like fish at least is the standard Swiss Christmas Eve meal. It's "traditional" amongst the Allegrini clan to have "Fondue Chinoise" - yes, Chinese fondue. It's not as weird as it sounds. The Swiss love to cook at the table, or rather have the guests participate in making their food. 
They have a big Asian soup tureen that's filled with boiling liquid (usually with vegetables and noodles). There there is a ton of wonderful fresh raw fish of all sorts. You put the fish into a little basket and let it sit in the boiling liquid to cook, then you eat it with an array of sauces (my favourite is the garlic) while the next basket cooks. Yummmm.
There's there's dessert. Of course that's followed by the cheese course and the chocolate course. 
And did I mention the wine? One of the useful things about being in an old cottage in a cold country, interesting places to cool wine and beer:
Note, the above photos were taken at 3 different homes, but the idea was the same at each - lots of food and wine! We always return saying we need to give our livers a break (and since I didn't know I was pregnant at the time, I was indeed enjoying the wine).
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Food and Drink or Why I love the Swiss
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3 comments:
Ha! Frederic's family does fondue chinoise as well for Christmas! Except we use meat instead of fish... Yum yum.
Monica - I've heard of a few other Swiss who do it too. They had some chicken as well, which I didn't realize was chicken until after I took it. I prefer the fish and ate a ton of it! We did this 2 nights since we celebrated Christmas in too different places, I had my fill of fish, but it was wonderful!
the Swiss family I had dinner with last Christmas eve was serving foie gras and fondue chinoise (beef) as well!
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