Recipe: Crostini with Fromage Forte

Fromage Forte

This is the second recipe in the series of dishes we did at the recent Kavana Men Cook event. I learned it from a Jacques Pepin cookbook ages ago. Fromage Forte of course means "strong cheese", and it is the best way I know to use up all those odds and ends of good cheese in your refrigerator. You can use just about any mixture of quality cheeses, but this isn’t a good place for "grocery store" cheddar type products. I like to have a mix of strong, mild, hard, and creamy, and blue cheeses to maximize the flavor.

The version I did for the Kavana event didn’t have much blue cheese because I was serving a hunk of it with the polenta course (recipe coming soon). We served it with simple crostini, just slices of baguette brushed with olive oil and toasted briefly under the broiler.

All you do is trim any rinds and mold off, add a little white wine, garlic, and black pepper, and spin the whole thing in a food processor until it is pretty creamy. If it is too thick and you don’t want to add more wine, you can use a little yogurt. It should be thick enough to stand up though, you don’t want it runny.

Fromage Forte (also sometimes spelled Fromage Fort)
Vegetarian (and obviously not vegan!)
Makes about 2 cups for a crostini topping or dip

• 1/2 lb. cheese scraps (see note above)
• 1/2 c. dry white wine
• black pepper to taste
• 1 clove garlic (or more to taste)
• salt if needed
• yogurt if needed

1. Trim rock hard or gross parts off of the cheese.
2. Put the cheese, wine, pepper, and garlic in a food processor and spin for a few minutes until no large chunks remain and the texture is fairly smooth.
3. If needed, add more wine or yogurt, and salt.
4. Store in the refrigerator. The flavor improves over a couple of days, but it is very tasty right away.
5. Serve on crostini, either as is or you can run it back under the broiler to make the cheese brown.