Mouclade and Cheese Fondue

Well the world's greatest wife made the world's greatest Friday night dinner today. I have wanted to make both these recipes for a while but fear and budgeting held me back. I'll start with the Mouclade.

First let me say I hate mussels as a general rule. It's not so much the taste of them. It's much, much more the look of them. I cannot help but notice the strong similarities between and cooked mussel and the female sex organs. And I've gotta tell ya..I just feel weird about eating something that makes me think of that. I feel so much more relaxed with a nice tofurky sausage. It just feels more natural. I guess if nothing else this is confirmation for me that I have joined the proper team by marrying a man. All my life people have been telling me "But mussels are so good how can you not want to eat them?" and I just squirm in my chair and say, no-no it's okay really. But this past summer while on holiday in Nova Scotia I was feeling a little adventurous or experimental shall we say and decided the time was ripe for me to try mussels. If you're going to have mussels the East Coast is the place to try them right? So we ordered mussels and I really, really liked them. Who knew?

Well, that experience got me over my initial fear so making the Mouclade wasn't quite as terrible as it would have been pre-holiday. If I could make these you could make these. It takes no time at all and even with me not being a big fan of the curry - I still liked these. (must be the 500ml of wine) And yes if you do think like I do regarding mussels and have some nerves, the wine will help loosen you up to help you take the plunge. However, I think I'm still gonna stick with the tofurky, sorry mussels but I'm just too straight for you.

Now the cheese fondue, this is the ultimate for me. Me and cheese are like peas and carrots, we just go together. I watched a little video of Nigella making this on-line today but to be honest I didn't have much time so I speed thru it pretty quick as in I watched the first 20 seconds and then skipped to the last 20 seconds. There were a bunch of reviews of the recipe on line too and it was about half and half with good/bad.That made me a little nervous. I omitted the kirsh because I read about how expensive it is and most people seemed of the opinion you can have a perfectly good fondue without the kirsh - so I trusted the word of strangers. This was incredibly simple to make - you just have to keep an eye on the melting cheese and give it a good stir every once in a while. This recipe also makes a TON. But I'm glad for that because now I have left overs that I can enjoy tomorrow. We dipped apples, bread and artichoke in the fondue and my god, it is heavenly. The people giving this a bad review have obviously no and I mean NO cooking skill. Or maybe they're illiterate and can't read the instructions ( not that I haven't done that before!) but you can't blame the recipe when you're the one whose the spaz.

Anyhow, making these 2 recipes together made for a perfect Friday night meal. Husband and I cozied up in front of the TV where we watched TMZ and laughed at people who are richer than us. This really was a perfect casual, but out of the ordinary meal and I highly recommend both these recipes to you whether together or separate. And whatever your sexual orientation.