Swiss Cheese and Chocolate

Switzerland has countless valleys of green
for cows to chomp on to produce milk to supply
the huge Swiss dairy industry.

Driving through Europe, you soon notice a little initial below the European Union star circle to the left of each car's number plate.  They let you know which country the car is registered in: F for France, B for Belgium, D for Deutschland(Germany) etc. People driving into Europe from Great Britain are encouraged to slap an extra large magnetic GB on the boot to let those used to driving on the right hand side of the road know that they have a loopy left hander amongst them. Cars from Switzerland don't have the stars because Switzerland is not part of the European Union they often have the red shield with the white cross and the letters CH. Their currency is Swiss Franks and on all the price tags it has CHF but the only thing I can think that the CH stands for is CHEESE or maybe CHOCOLATE!

Plates!

The Swiss are fairly serious about their food; in 2000,  Josef Zisyadis, a member of Parliament, obtained 2 million CHF from the Federal Government and more from the Canton governments and private businesses to create the 'Culinary Heritage of Switzerland' association.  It even made an encyclopedia of the research compiled. The website includes recipes and lists of processed food that is Swiss, been in production for at least forty years and is still in production.  http://www.kulinarischeserbe.ch/default.aspx?page=ucSearch 

Different regional chocolate companies, Cailler was the first
Swiss chocolate maker. I think the company has been
bought out by Nestlé.
I don't think Muesli chocolate is very healthy?!

Cheese and Chocolate are major food groups and were in plentiful supply on our journey. Each Canton seemed to have their own specialties, heavily influenced by the food culture of the language they speak. Last Easter we dropped into Zurich after our drive down the Blackforest Rd and had a little shop in the Lindt factory store there. Strangely, this worldwide face of Switzerland is not the only choc co. around the place, in fact I think I saw less Lindt self space in supermarkets here that in the French ones. We didn't see a single Lindt cafe - there are three in the Sydney CBD!  Of course the Toblerone in all it's many guises flashed it's Matterhorn symbol at us from every food and souvenir store we walked past.

Laderach specialise in slabs of chocolate with different flavours but had yummy truffle eggs as well, they are everywhere in Switzerland. This one is in the train station at Geneve. The Bachmann stores seemed only to be in Luzern and had so much more than chocolate.

The best hot chocolate we had was at a very entertaining chocolate shop in Interlarken. The store was called Funky Chocolate Club. They stocked chocolate from artisans from all over Switzerland and used chocolate from all over the world to create their 'salads' - they argue that since cacao comes from a tree so is a plant that chocolate is technically a salad. They have a workshop where you can mold your own special creations and blend a variety of Lindt and spices into the perfect hot chocolate. A shelf full of large chocolate phallus' with a sign threatening to send one to your mother from you as a gift if you mess about with them gurgled up a giggle or two. I imagine that some stock had meet a sticky end at the hands of a few crudely immature customers at some stage.

Left: A souvenir M was keen for me to purchase from one of the kitchen shops.
Right: Funky Chocolate down a side street in Interlarken - hot chocolate through a straw.

These were from Bachmann in time for Easter Sunday but the
after Easter sales of choc were tempting! Duckie from the Hotel

The ultimate reference for a country's chocolate expertise must be Petals' comment after gnawing on an Easter bin sale rabbit - 'this is really good chocolate and it is just the supermarket brand'.

Petal first fell in love with the Swiss staple after buying a bar from Bachmann in Luzern (Look out for the bright pink logos). This smooth and buttery milk chocolate was a little sweeter than normal but converted a lolly fiend into a chocolate devourer, more protein and calcium so I'm not complaining. Bachmann also has a cat as their mascot, cats seem to find Petal wherever we go and ask for a pat. We didn't see a Bachmann store anywhere else so on returning to Luzern she popped into one of the station stores to buy another block for herself and one for Willow.

Squeaks of excitement emanated from Petal as we perused the grocery aisles, one of our favourite travel pastimes. In the cereal aisle she found a box of Ovaltine crisps, spelt Ovomaltine but with the same distinctive orange packaging. In the fridges were rows of Ovaltine chocolate milk and the biscuit aisle sported a cream biscuit. The chocolate aisle produced oohs and ahhs. Her favourite infant school tuck shop snack of Ovaltinies were here and the sight of them prompted revelations about ingenious strategies that Petal and her cousin, Tas, contrived in order to snaffle a packet in the toilets during class. Leelee called them Sly and Gobbo with very good reason. There were Ovaltine breakfast bars, snack bars, and blocks of the aerated malted goodie. We did not get one of everything! The Hotels she liked the most were the ones who had Ovomaltine or Suchard express sachets in their breakfast buffets. The breakfasts I liked the most were the ones with the Swiss Bircher Muesli and a sort of jellied cranberry sauce to pour on top.

The almond/gingerbread style cookie on the left was not to M's
taste but anytime was good for a Movenpic moment!

One thing we were unable to do was go on the Golden Pass Chocolate train, it only runs May-October. For CHF99 per adult(1/2 price with the Swiss pass) you get coffee and chocolate croissant chugging up the mountain, a bus trip to Gruyeres and their cheese factory then down to the Cailler-Nestlé factory before chugging back down to Montreux. Kids are half price (Free with the Swiss pass).

Left: Hand moulding cheese in the ultra modern Engelberg Dairy built inside an old Abbey.                 Right: Tete de Moine

There were so many other regional cheeses. One that looked very pretty in the sandwich shops and delis was Tete de Moine (translates to Head of Monk, a cylinder of cheese that was made in an Abbey. The monks kept one per monk(per head) and gave the rest away). It is cut by a Girolle creating super fine slices that fold up into rosettes; they call these chanterelles because they look similar to the golden mushrooms with the frilly edges.  Strangely we didn't see anything much of the holey cheese I always think of as Swiss, we saw a lot more of it in the Netherlands. A big tourist service is providing tasting tours of cheese factories.

At a Cafe in Yverdon-les-Bains I first saw the word Flammenkuche and ordered one off the menu - it sounded dramatic, I got the vegetarian one, always safer! A little disappointing - there was no flambé, just a rectangular pizza. Quite tasty but just a pizza with no tomato base. The other cheesy food we had a try of was Kasekuchen, the slice of this we were served was a cross between a pizza and welsh rarebit. A thick cheese topping on a bread type base.

Fondue in Zermatt

A cheesy joy that I was determined to try was the legendary Fondue. While at Zermatt we decided to have a late lunch for this initiation, we thought so much cheese near to bedtime might nightmares release. Many of the restaurants offered the oh so Swiss dish. The traditional option was served with chunks of day old bread ( I think the fresh stuff would have folded under the weight) and tiny boiled potatoes.  Some offered Fondue with truffle, some with Champagne but all were served in a thick ceramic pot on top of a oil burner to keep it hot. M covered the flame with the little lid provided when ours began to bubble - the gloopy splurts weren't pleasant when they landed on your hands. The one we had was made with Freiburger Vacherin and Gruyere. 

By Lusanne, I already had the emergency
extra bag for grocery items out and in use!

When I went to pay for the meal, the woman behind the bar was keen to practice her English and started giving me tips about making Fondue. She said the big rule was to never let the cheese get hotter than 50 degrees and that a mix of cheeses was better than just one type. She warned me that adding cornstarch as some recipes said was only necessary if the cheese split after overheating and that putting wine in to make it easier to melt the cheese at the beginning only diluted the full joy of the fondue experience. She also advised me to stir all the time until a skin formed over the hole in the wooden spoon (a special bit of Fondue making kit apparently).

It was very rich.  On the table was a Swiss seasoning we often saw in Cafes - both in granulated and liquid form - called Aromat.  I found if I cut the little potato in half and dipped it in this Soy sauce type of fluid (but with deeper more complex tones) it cut through the weight of the cheese.  M started double dipping his spuds by rolling them in the air (we were sitting outside enjoying the snow topped mountain views) to harden up then would dip them a second time before gobbling. A more common practice by the locals was to dampen (not soak) the bread in whatever spirit or wine they had ordered before fondueing. We didn't try it with our apple juice!

There are a lot of kitchen souvenir shops in Switzerland, one thing we saw in several places were bread knives with the cutting edge in the shape of the mountain ranges in the area, named on the blade too. We saw thermometers along with the long handled forks and pot holding paraphernalia in the stores for people wanting to cook up a fondue at home.  I really think that is best kept to a place with mountain views after a big day of snow sports. Sometimes when the kids had friends over I'd do a chocolate fondue with strawberries and marshmallows thanks to the kit Poss gave to Petal one Christmas, I think that's as far as we'll go.

The peaks opposite Geneve - imagine the bumpy horizon exaggerated slightly, cast in steel, sharpened and cutting bread.

Rosti and fried egg at Stadel,
Zermatt. Soo many good
restaurants there.

Another dish we enjoyed was the Rosti.  Mum used to call them potato fritters. They serve them in Switzerland as plate sized pancakes, To make:1/2 cook the potatoes the day before, skin then grate when cold, mix with some egg and seasoning, sprinkle over a hot, oiled pan, flip half way through to achieve a golden brown on both sides then serve immediately with cheese melted on top under the grill, fried eggs or sausage and onion gravy.  This used to be a common Swiss breakfast but is served any time now.

With the German influence, the spargle (asparagus) season was being celebrated. We went to a brilliant restaurant in Zermatt, China Garden; M's cheese threshold had been reached! They served an asparagus and cashew dish that was delish. A store keeper up at Gornergrat was slurping up white spargle in burnt butter sauce between customers queuing at her desk. I was a bit nervous that my postcards would have an added sniff and lick quality.

Amazing interior murals and delicious Chinese veg dishes.  China Garden - Zermatt

One of the best meals we had was at Weggis; The Alpenblick Hotel's Garden Restaurant.  They offered one set menu each evening and you bought whichever elements you wanted. We got in fairly late so just ordered the main. It was a wild garlic risotto with honeyed fennel and a perfectly aged beef steak.  They served our three dishes on one platter with large serving spoons and empty hot plates at our places. Both practices are interesting innovations in keeping costs and service times down. I noticed that the same three women did everything from reception to waiting tables and bar tending. It looked like they were slowly renovating the place - I guess once they're done families won't really be able to afford to stay there.  The top three floors of the six level building with sauna indoor pool and underground garaging, were permanent residents. Another clever way of keeping rooms full!

A post card showing all the Cantons of Switzerland - most have their own types of cheese and special dishes.  The original European fusion food - blending the best from France, Germany and Italy with their own leaning towards Dairy. 

Another excellent discovery was how into apples the Swiss are. Apparently this big cider swigging country nearly lost this culinary heritage when apple juice became unpopular in the sixties, trees were cut out by bankrupt orcharders and vineyards sprung up. Happily the trend is reversing and the apple is golden again. Most lakeside homes and farms had espaliered apple trees budding up. We also found the best sparkling apple juice ever, it had deep rich toffee tones. We brought a few 2L bottles home with us - thank goodness we drove! Head office of Ramseier is at Sursee whose pretty train station we passed through on our way from Lucern to Bern.  Wish someone from the company would decide to emigrate to NZ and put some of their wonderful apple crops to good use with a remembered recipe!

Apples growing along a fence in Weggis

The apple of course has historical significance to the very birth of the country. People from different Alpine valleys got together and decided they were going to stop the surrounding nationalities marching through their land to fight each other, wrecking their properties and resources in the process. They formed guerrilla groups of alpine gangs, I wonder if yodeling was the war cry for their resistance? One group who used to be part of them had gotten big and powerful, the Austrians had become a nation in their own right and was trying to absorb the smaller Swiss states into itself with the use of deputised Sheriffs.

As always in legends of this type (so similar to Robin Hood!) there was a bad sheriff! Gessler is the power hungry and greedy exploiter in this tale, he was sheriff of the canton of Uri and had his castle at the opposite end of the lake to where Luzern is now. The capital town was Altdorf and one day an Alpine hunter, William Tell, arrived with his son. In the centre of the market square he refused to bow to the pole with Gessler's peacock feather adorned hat on top. For this act of rebellion Tell's son was tied to the pole with an apple balanced on his head. Gessler ordered Tell to shoot the apple off his son's head or watch while his guards butchered him. I would imagine that the whole town had gathered by now - what a spectacle. So when William Tell did successfully split the apple with his arrow, without causing any harm to his son, Gessler's guards were outnumbered and the boy was set free. William however was arrested because a second arrow slipped from his cloak and he admitted that if he had hurt his son it would have been turned on the Sheriff.  Eventually one of William's arrows did pierce Gessler's heart in a later ambush - or so the story goes. The Swiss Confederation threw off the yoke of Austrian domination. The apple(in liquid form) is used to toast the nation.
For a more complete version of the story look at http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/william-tell--killer-or-freedom-fighter-/31244332 

It's hard to find paracetamol in Switzerland.
Everyone seems to use the naturopath apothecaries,
no wonder Riccola is such a huge company.

One of the things I have really enjoyed about our journeys from place to place is seeing how people in different places throw together the same sorts of ingredients in different ways to create such a huge variety of eating experiences,

By the way, the reason Switzerland, a country of so many languages, has CH for its initials is because its official title is The Swiss Confederation. (In French - Suisse, Italian - Svizzera, Romansh - Svizra and German, the largest language group - Schweiz.) The variety is celebrated and bonds of nationhood (since August 1 1291) are steeped more deeply in the cantons' constant battles for independence from its bordering states, the style of democracy that has kept the harmony between them so successfully and their Alpine roots.
Perhaps not to offend any of the language groups, they have written the name of their confederated states in Latin - which is Confoederatio Helvetica - thus CH. I applaud their nonpartisan efforts, but knowing this won't stop me thinking chocolate, or cheese whenever I see a Swiss registered car!

 A great way to take in the scenery.  Uri, the Canton William Tell hunted in, is just beyond the end of this arm of the lake.
Coffee in Brunnen - home of Victorinox - see another blog for that thrill.