Fondue, just like Jesus used to have

Ham is a normal easter meal.

I am not entirely sure why, though now I want to look it up, but it does not really matter; we have never been huge on ham in a familial way, so it was just fine with me when my sister-in-law, Ruth, suggested that we fondue.

It's not just for the 70's anymore. I figure that if a fledgling religion can commandeer a pagan festival and try to convince us that eggs and bunnies have something to do with Jesus' death on the cross and supposed subsequent resurrection, then we can cook meat on metal sticks in a small cauldron of steaming broth.

Because I am picky, a bit of a food snob, a control freak, and, oh yeah, pregnant, I kind of took over. I finally have energy again, and I may not have it for long. Also, it's nice to feel like a grown up and be able to do things for my family as they had to help me out a lot in my twenties. It's one of the only ways I want to be a grown-up, in fact. That and paying my bills, being a responsible worker, and being self-reliant so that I can be of benefit to society. But THAT'S IT!

Ruth gave me a list of what she wanted, and boy, was it an extensive list. It was good, though, because it gave me a little more direction and a couple of challenges. Mushroom-rubbed steak? OK. I don't know where to find mushrooms affectionate enough to want to do such a thing, but now that you bring it up as a possibility, I feel that I must succeed.

I procured supplies at the co-op and began the preparations on Friday afternoon and evening, preparing the broth, marinating the teriyaki steak, rubbing the mushrooms on the steak (they would not do it themselves), and making sauces. I also made a butter pound cake and brownies. Then I watched Star Trek and went to bed. In the morning, I finished up a few more sauces and cut up the chicken. I figured I could get Mom and Ruth to help with the rest.

The meal consisted of two cheese fondues (Traditional Swiss and Mexican) with bread, apples, tortilla chips, and assorted veggies. Then the broth with three kinds of steak, chicken, shrimp, ravioli, and... I feel like I am missing something...

We finished with a double chocolate fondue (next time with some hazelnut, I think) with various fruit and the brownies and pound cake.

There was a lot of food.

Fondue is an interesting meal. It's very labor intensive though technically, people cook it themselves. I cut up pounds of meat, Mom deveined and shelled a pound of shrimp, Ruth and Mom cut up veggies and fruit, I baked, and I made steak, bbq, mushroom, lemon cream, teriyaki, sour cream curry, california, and... and... I feel like I am missing something.

(That happens a lot now, by the way. The Missing Something Feeling.)

Fondue is also a slow meal. We ate from 1:15 until 7:00 with small breaks to transition to the next course as well as a longer break between meat and sweet in which we colored Jesus's eggs with authentic Hinkle's Dye from Columbia, PA (it's the only way to do it), hid them, and the kids found them and their Easter baskets. You also eat in bites of food. You have 8 forks in the little pot, cooking 8 pieces of the meat of choice. At the end, you did not have a steak or a chicken breast, you had 25 bites of assorted foods.

The warring fondue forks also make fondue a rather tragic meal. Things fall off, things fall apart, and the action stops. Jim was the lifeguard. The pool was cleared, and the victim retrieved. I would have just let the little sucker drown.

Oh, and I just read some blather on the internet about how the ham-eating tradition started in England hundreds of years ago and is somehow related to the fact that Germans supposedly believe that pigs are good luck, though I don't see how being so unfortunate as to be eaten could possibly be lucky.

And I forgot about the potatoes and the green goddess sauce.