Catching Up With an Old Friend

     A long time ago, I took up cooking as a hobby, gradually acquiring recipes and technical expertise, and I began sharing meals with the missionaries and with friends. The joy of this kind of social entertainment came into sharp and clear focus rather gradually, and received a big boost in October of 1977, whilst I was a young and single missionary in Switzerland. I had just spent 17 months in the Germany Frankfurt mission, the one to which I was originally called. However, circumstances played out such that I was transferred, with nine other Frankfurt elders, to the Switzerland Zürich mission.

    Less than two weeks in the Land of the Swiss, my companion and I were invited for dinner to the home of Werner and Nelly Riesen. At the time, he was the young Elders Quorum president in the Winterthur ward. He and Nelly had just welcomed their first child, Claudia, into their home barely two months previously. Usually, if you are invited to a Fondue dinner in a Swiss home, you will most likely be presented with a pot of deliciously melted Gruyère and Emmenthaler cheeses, with a bowl full of fresh bread chunks, which you put on a long fork to dip into the cheese mix.

    At the Riesens', however, we encountered something completely new to us: Fondue Chinoise (Chinese Fondue). It consisted of a strong beef and tomato broth in the pot, surrounded by a platter of thinly-sliced steak strips. These are placed, one at a time, on a long fondue fork and dipped into the broth. Being so thin, they don't need to cook for very long, and once taken out, you can dip it into any one of a number of sauces surrounding the pot. There are lots of different things to nosh on besides steak, and the meal is designed to be accompanied by a lot of animated conversation, a Swiss staple. A real fondue dinner can take hours. We had the time of our lives.

    In the ensuing 45+ years, I have never forgotten the Riesens for this wonderful dinner, and as I gradually learned to cook, we had hundreds of missionaries (and lots of friends) over for dinner. Putting on a dinner party has become just about my favorite thing to do, and I like to offer the best meal I possibly can. I tend to go on cooking "jihads" as I call them, to teach myself new recipes and techniques. Chicago-style pizza was one of the first, then New York pizza. Leesa gave me a John Grisham book, Playing for Pizza, from which I learned to cook a five-course Italian dinner, including the main entrée, Rotolo di Pasta. I make my own pasta for that one.

    I got a Traeger smoker three years ago, and just before that I started learning to make pie crusts from my good friend Kate McDermott of Port Angeles, Washington. So people began enjoying slow-smoked baby back ribs and strawberry-rhubarb pies at our table.

    Yesterday, Wednesday, the 12th of April, 2023 began with a lot of anticipation. Last November, Leesa and I were called to the Alpine German-speaking mission, and I thought of the potential opportunity to visit my old friend Werner Riesen at his home in Frauenfeld, Switzerland. I wrote him a letter expressing my deep gratitude for the meal that inspired the journey of cooking and hospitality in my life.

    Either because I'm a technical idiot, or the mission phones have a block preventing calling between countries, I had to work with the Frauenfeld missionaries, Elders Menssen and Suominen, from Saratoga Springs, Utah, and Finland, respectively, to communicate with Brother Werner to set up a time when we could visit him.

    

    We had a nice lunch with them, and then we headed to downtown Frauenfeld to look up a Migros grocery store. Migros (MEE-grows) was the first European retailer who embraced the American concept of the large grocery store. Most groceries in Europe are small affairs, and you get produce at one place, dairy in another, meats in yet another, then on to the bakery. Migros does it all, and they have a strict policy of not selling anything alcoholic. Tailor-made for Church members.

    Well, the one we visited yesterday was laid out like a huge department store on several levels, with escalators and all kinds of differents shops: a jeweler, a restaurant, a florist, eyeglasses, a dentist, with their grocery store in the huge basement. We wanted to pick up something nice for Werner when we dropped by, and we found this:

    An entire aisle with walls on both sides devoted exclusively to Swiss chocolate! Now THAT'S hitting below the belt, gotta tell y'all. 

    We also stopped by Kehlhofstraße 11A, where we missionaries had our apartment back in my day. Like most buildings in both Switzerland and in Freiburg, this one predated the birth of George Washington. 

(me in 1977)

(yesterday)

    Then, finally, on to our long-awaited 2 p.m. meeting with Werner. He was there, eagerly awaiting our arrival, and we just picked up where we'd left off 45 years ago. Yeah, we're both slower and fatter than we were then, but we got very animated very quickly talking about cooking, fine foods, natural ingredients, and cooking tricks and techniques.

    Werner brought out a massive cake, Chocolate Cream (from Migros), and served us just huge slices. Leesa and I just looked at each other and shrugged (what the heck, let's just go with it). Three hours later, we had to say our goodbyes, but not before he invited us back for another Fondue Chinoise. We'll probably take him up on it during the slower summer months. I promise a full report will be filed.

    One other thing, the German language has two forms of addressing someone, "Sie" (Zee) and "Du" (doo). Sie is the more formal, whereas Du is the familiar. Out of respect, I chose to address Werner with Sie, and let him more or less guide the agenda. Well, it didn't take long for us to adopt the "du" with each other, but he did it in such a charming way. He asked how old I was. I told him 67. And then he said, "Well, the invitation to "du" should come from the older person, and since I'm only 41, that'll have to come from you."

Until next post, love to you all!