This year on November 28th, my wife and I celebrated our 35th wedding anniversary. We celebrated, as we always do, having fondue at The Melting Pot. In this case, we were in Tallahassee, Florida. We prefer the traditional cheese fondue and love getting the veggies, dark bread, and our absolute favorite, tart green apple pieces. Yummy! We had a great meal and spent the night remembering our 25th anniversary trip in 2006 when we went to Switzerland (and how getting fondue wasn’t as easy as you might think!).
Based on the weather, we chose to do our anniversary trip in July rather than in November. So on our third day in Switzerland, we were in Lausanne and found a beautiful restaurant up on a hill overlooking the city. Seeing fondue on the menu, we ordered it. It was mid-afternoon and a beautiful day. We were seated outside and practically had the restaurant to ourselves.
Our fondue arrived and, with the traditional mix of Gruyere and Emmentaler cheeses, there was a plate of bread. Just bread? We looked at each other and said, “I wonder why we didn’t get the veggies and the apples?”
When the server came back out, we asked her if we could have something besides bread for our fondue. She looked quizzically at us, like she didn’t understand. In my best attempt at French I said, “Pomme verte, s’il vous plait,” (green apples, please.)
She looked at us like we had asked for a plate of diamonds and said, “Oh no, we only serve apples for fondue on very special occasions!” This struck us both as incredibly funny, but we convinced her that it was our 25th anniversary and that seemed important enough for her to go get us some apples.
On that same July 2006 trip, we spent several days in Interlaken. This area is home to the Jungfrau, Monch, and Eiger mountains and some beautiful lakes. It is also home to some relatives of my wife’s nephew, who run a bed and breakfast just outside of town. We spent several days there and had an amazing time. Pascal and Cindy Zeller were the owners and they provided us with great insight into getting the most out of the local attractions (you can check them out at http://swissholidayhouse.com, trust me, it’s amazing.)
Of course, we asked them where we could find some fondue and Pascal looked at us like we were crazy! “Fondue — It’s summertime!” We assured him that we would find fondue with or without his help, so he agreed to make fondue for us on our last night at the chalet. We had a great dinner that night and he relayed that when he went to the cheese shop to order the ingredients for dinner, the cheese shop owner gave him a hard time about getting fondue in July. He blamed it on “the Americans.”
We like what we like. And so, regardless of how hard it is to do in the summertime, we order fondue when we are Switzerland. It just seems a lot easier to get what we want at The Melting Pot. But getting the cheese in Switzerland where the cows are just a few miles away makes it more worthwhile.
David is an international speaker, executive coach, serial entrepreneur, and shipwreck survivor. He is the bestselling author of Grounded (Little River, 2016) . If you’re interested in David’s expertise in the areas of leadership, finance, and public speaking, please get in touch here.