When it comes to French regional cuisine, nothing typifies the sense of rich, creamy indulgence like tartiflette, the French alpine specialty that you will find on just about every menu in the Savoie-Alpes region of France. The dish is made from potatoes, cream, onion, lardons, white wine – and, of course, about as much Reblochon cheese as you can get your hands on. It is served as a hearty, nourishing, powerful gratin-like potato bake, rich in fat and protein to thoroughly warm you up, or replenish yourself after a long day of hitting the slopes.
The prevalence of potatoes in French regional cuisine dates back to the 15th century, as a result of the Fall of Constantinople and the subsequent blocking of trade routes for spices and Eastern food imports. This forced French cuisine to rely heavily on the ingredients available to them, which after the Columbian exploitation of South American crops in 1482, included potatoes. The name of the dish comes from the Savoyard (Franco-Provençal dialect) word tartifla, which means potato.
Interestingly, the addition of Reblochon cheese to the traditional recipe, which was known as pela, is a result of promotion of the Syndicat Interprofessionnel du Reblochon in the 1980s, who managed to successfully redesign the recipe and its key ingredient. The cheese renders it essentially impossible to recreate a true tartiflette in Australia (whose laws prevent the importing of foreign raw milk products), and the cheese itself is also protected under French Appellation d’origine contrôlée laws, reflecting, like its name and history, the connection of the recipe to the region’s “terroir”.
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