Our first exchange student, Yves, introduced us to several dishes from his home, although his idea of cooking often involved opening a package and following the directions. As a farewell gift, his parents procured a raclette, specially built to work with American electric sources. It’s a marvelous little device that is essentially a small tabletop broiler with individual pans on which you melt the cheese for the eponymous dish.
Although there is also a raclette cheese which is supposed to be used in this dish, it can be made with nearly any cheese. (Limburger is a notable and memorable exception!) This is an especially effective way to use up all of the cheese left over from the Julbord.
You can still enjoy the dish without the device – it’ll just take some inventiveness on your part. A small, well-seasoned cast-iron skillet used in the oven under the broiler should work nicely.
Wash and boil until cooked through:
1 kg new potatoes (small young potatoes, typically 3-6 cm in diameter)
Prepare a selection of toppings, which may include any of the following that strike your fancy:
raclette cheese
other cheeses
green onions (cut into ½-1 cm lengths)
chives
ham (diced into ½-cm cubes)
bacon (fried crisp and crumbled)
pineapple (crushed or chunk)
cocktail onions
Arrange your chosen cheese on the raclette pan or your skillet. Dress it with the toppings you desire, and broil it until the cheese is bubbly and slightly browned.
Take a couple of potatoes and mash them up on your plate, and then use a wooden paddle to slide the cheese on top of the potatoes. Let cool slightly and enjoy!