Sinful Switzerland

Neelam Mathews samples some of the most delectable Swiss chocolate and cheese offerings

When I die,” I said to my friend, “I’m not going to be embalmed. I’m going to be dipped.” “Milk chocolate or bittersweet?” was her immediate concern.

How many of us would like that to happen in our lives?

Chocolate inspires. The author of Bittersweet in Bern, was motivated to write the novel when sharing a Toblerone with his wife on a park bench across the street from the Tobler factory in Bern, Switzerland.

That chocolate is the perfect accompaniment to travel cannot be more apparent than in Switzerland, home to the heavenly but sinful creation. Today, there is a chocolate company that has even started a spa to cater to chocolate addicts! So close is chocolate to the Swiss psyche that the Toblerone acquired its triangular shape as it was modelled on Switzerland’s biggest icon- the Matterhorn! It was incidentally, the first triangular chocolate to be protected by law. While the 100gm version is the most popular bar, if you want to go overboard, then you can buy a huge 4.5 kg bar, which is close to the amount of chocolate an average Australian eats in a year!

And what can make more sense than using chocolate as a restorative after hours of enjoying Mount Pilatus or walking in Lucerne through its cathedrals and museums? But then, that’s not all that the Swiss have perfected. Cheese has long been a staple of the Swiss diet, a fact that’s hardly surprising in a nation where, until recent times, dairy cows outnumbered bankers, foreign investors and tourists.

In The Swiss Cookbook, Nika Standen Hazelton writes: ‘Cheese was a standard food as early as in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. The early cheeses were simple products made from soured milk, such as homemade cottage cheese, and well into the nineteenth century many rural households knew no other. The solid, lasting cheeses that we know as Swiss cheese turned up in the fifteenth century, when they served as convenience food for travellers and soldiers.’

Today, a single wheel of Emmentaler for the export market may be worth US $2,500 by the time it’s been sawn into blocks and sold by the slice at your local deli counter. This pale yellow cheese is produced by some 1,600 dairies in the Emmental Valley of German-speaking Switzerland. It has a mild, nutty taste and is distinguished by large holes that are formed by pockets of gas during fermentation that lasts anywhere from three to six months.

To discover Switzerland’s most savoured chocolates and cheese, a special train called the Chocolate Train operates from Montreux to the Nestle-Cailler chocolate factory at Broc. The train stops at Gruyere offering tourists the opportunity to sight-see and savour delicacies made from the famous cheese that this area produces. This is home to the firm, pungent and slightly nutty-tasting cheese, Gruyere, another Swiss favourite, made in smaller wheels than Emmentaler.

If you’re a more dedicated foodie than me and if your nose can withstand the rigors of touring a cheese cellar, it’s a fantastic experience. I couldn’t make it more than a few feet into the cellar before the smell sent me reeling for some fresh air. One of the great mysteries of cheese is how something that tastes so heavenly in its mellow old age can smell so hellish in its childhood.

The ideal way to round up the tour is a cheese fondue as no Swiss cheese tour is complete without one. Your best choice would be fondue made in Gruyere as it turns creamy when melted and its tangy flavour makes it popular in the classic Swiss fondue that one is likely to get in major restaurants all over Switzerland, normally served to a minimum of two persons.

But fondue is best savoured in tiny Swiss chalets. Memories of a cold day atop a mountain, savouring warm melted cheese with long forks from an earthenware pot, heated over a flame with white wine, a splash of Kirsch or brandy, still brings back a rush of delectable memories. For the choco-obsessive Swiss, chocolate fondue is another variant (served as a dessert, one should hasten to add!). Cafi du Soleil in Geneva is reputed to serve Switzerland’s best fondue.

After a three-hour stop over, the Chocolate Train is off again. Broc Fabrique, a picturesque terminus station, is just a short walk from the Nestle chocolate factory where the ever present aroma of chocolate is characteristic of the ambience. Here, an amazing variety of chocolates are available at factory prices. Choices include bitter, sweet, white, dark, with nuts without nuts - the variety is mind blowing.

Your Swiss mentor will help you as you learn to roll and twirl the magical chocolate while it melts in your mouth and voila you have perfected the art of pure gourmandise!