Fondue

Want to bring the Melting Pot home so all your family can enjoy the fun of this dinning experience? This is a combination of some of their best recipes tailored down to do just that. All these recipes can be changed to be just the appetizer or create your own three course (or more) meal! Be prepared that the meal itself takes a long time to eat as there are lots of steps in between each corse.

Cheese Fondue Appetizer
Ingredients:
3 cups of shredded cheddar cheese
3 tbsp of flour
1 beer

Dippers (all cubed prior to dinner and set aside or refrigerated):
Sourdough bread
Green apples
Chips
Carrots
Cauliflower
(Whatever you have on hand that goes good with cheese!)

Directions:
Shred your cheddar cheese. For every 1 1/2 c of cheddar, you are going to coat it with 1 1/2 tbsp of flour.
Warm your fondue pot, add 1 1/2 c of the coated cheddar cheese to the pot. Slowly add in the beer and whish with a fork. Repeat for the next 1 1/2 c of cheese. *The last time I made this, I didn't use the entire can of beer. I just added as much as I thought I needed. I add the liquid as I go so I don't make it too watery.
Once the cheese is at a stringy consistancy, dip your veggies!

Here is the Melting Pots how to video which I find very helpful. http://www.monkeysee.com/play/1273-Fiesta-Cheese-Fondue

The next course could be a salad of your choice, but with little ones we leave this step out and go straight to the main course.

Coq Au Vain Cooking Broth
Ingredients:
3 1/2 c of veggie stock
1/2 red wine (usually whatever I'm drinking for the night works fine)
1 tbsp of finely chopped garlic
2 green onions chopped

Dippers: (again all cubed and refrigerated prior to dinner)
2 chicken breasts
1 filet
(Before, we've done shrimp or lobster)
Broccoli

The main dish is where you can be as simple as you wish or as creative as you feel. Tonight, we went simple but before we've done oil and fried everything. When we do that, I love doing button mushrooms stuffed with Alloiette. Yum-O! The fried fondue is another recipe in itself, but is just as fun to make.

Directions:
Bring the vegetable stock, red wine, garlic and onion to a boil. Cook your chicken and steak on your fondue sticks in the broth. You will cook the chicken about 2 minutes to make sure it's no longer pink. The filet can be cooked to your liking. During this time, we always throw in our broccoli. We like it best when the vegetables absorb all the juices and flavor from the broth. The broccoli takes the longest. We don't pull it out until it looks wilted.

Dessert is up to you. By this point, our family is stuffed and I'm tired of washing the fondue pot out so if we do dessert, ice cream sundaes are the way we go.

Prep time takes a while but if you do everything before hand, dinner is way more enjoyable! This is fun and even the kids do well.