This month, in honor of the holidays, we’ve asked our Culinary Arts and Pastry & Baking Arts instructors to share their favorite festive recipes. We've already traveled to Australia with Chef Kathryn Gordon's mince tartelettes and celebrated American nostalgia with Chef Scott McMillen's snickerdoodles. Today, we head back abroad with Chef Ted Siegel's Alsatian tarte flambée.
One of my favorite, recent memories of Christmas is from the Rhine river cruise my partner Cheryl and I took during the Christmas week of 2010. The cruise began at the Swiss city of Basel and slowly worked its way up the Rhine to Amsterdam. One of our stops was Colmar, a beautiful medieval city in the French region of Alsace, which is known for its savory tartes.
We came upon a "jewel box" of a Christmas market in the center of the old town, by the Dominican church at Place des Dominicaines. The scene was almost idyllic. A deep chill in the air, snow falling and icicles hanging from the old shingled, medieval buildings. The aromas in the air were intoxicating- the sweet spices of mulled wine, the smoke of the wood-burning fireplaces, and the smell of toasting tarte flambées oozing with melty, soft-ripened Muenster cheese, crème fraîche and crackling hunks of slab bacon.
Needless to say, we stopped at the first stand to warm ourselves with spiced mulled wine made from Alsatian pinot noir and to sample what was - by far - the most profoundly decadent tarte flambée one could ever hope to eat. The flavor combination of the rich cheese and smoked bacon, the crisp texture and crunch of the baked dough left us breathless. To this day, we have not stopped talking about that moment. It was one of those rare experiences where time stands still and everything is absolutely perfect!