Classic Cheese Fondue for Two

Use room temperature wine and add cheese gradually to prevent seizing. Stir constantly in figure-eight pattern for smooth texture. If fondue gets too thick, add a splash of warm wine. Keep heat low or cheese will become stringy. Traditional etiquette says if you lose your bread, you owe your companion a kiss.

Cheese fondue has its roots in the Swiss Alps, where long winters and geographic isolation forced communities to make the most of what they had — specifically, aging cheese and stale bread. The earliest firm recipe for cheese fondue as we recognize it today (cheese melted with wine, served for bread-dipping) was published in 1875, and within years Swiss food writers were already calling it a national dish. The word fondue comes from the French verb fondre, meaning "to melt," and was first recorded in print in 1735 referring to an egg-and-cheese dish. In the 1930s, the Swiss Cheese Union (Schweizerische Käseunion) launched an aggressive promotional campaign to increase cheese consumption, promoting fondue as the definitive symbol of Swiss national identity and distributing fondue sets to the Swiss military. Fondue reached the United States at the 1964 New York World's Fair, where the Swiss Pavilion's Alpine restaurant served it to American visitors for the first time at scale. Wikipedia confirms its US popularity peaked in the 1960s and 1970s, when fondue sets became among the most popular wedding gifts and fondue parties a staple of dinner-party culture. The tradition that dropping bread in the pot requires a penalty — in Switzerland, buying a round of drinks, or running outside in the snow — is a genuine Swiss custom that traveled with the dish and made it a uniquely playful, interactive meal.