This french tartiflette recipe blends potatoes, bacon, onions and gooey Reblochon cheese into a delicious potato casserole dish. French comfort food at its best and easy to make with just a few ingredients.
What is tartiflette savoyard?
Tartiflette is a traditional french potato dish originating from the Savoy region in France, more specifically in the French Alps, hence the name tartiflette savoyarde. Tartiflette is a delicious dish of winter comfort food, normally served after a long day on the ski slopes in the Alps. I personally think this dish should not only be served in winter time as it tastes great all year round.
The main ingredient to make a tartiflette authentic is the Reblochon cheese, which is a semi-soft cheese from the Haute-Savoie region in France, made from unpasteurised milk. It has a mild flavour, slightly fruity and nutty and gives the tartiflette dish its traditional flavour.
How to make tartiflette
This french potato and cheese dish is fairly easy to make with just a few ingredients. Tartiflette ingredients include: Reblochon cheese, potatoes, onions, garlic and lardons or bacon. In fact, the most complicated part of the dish will be to source a Reblochon cheese as it’s not available for sale in some countries.
I would also like to mention that there are various ways to make tartiflette. It is more important that the main ingredients are used than exactly how it’s made. For instance, you can decide to first boil the potatoes al dente before proceeding with the rest of the recipe or peel the potatoes or not. Some recipes use cream, I however decided not to use it, since the dish is pretty heavy already without any cream.
Anyway, this is a french recipe for tartiflette that works for me and gives me the best results to get the authentic flavours of a tartiflette dish.
What to use instead of Reblochon?
Due to certain laws, Reblochon cheese is not available in the US and some other countries. But don’t worry, there are some Reblochon substitutes that work well to use as tartiflette cheese. Cheeses that work well and give the gooey texture are Raclette cheese, Swiss Gruyere cheese, Teleggio cheese or a well aged Brie or Camembert.
Cooking steps
Note: All the exact quantities of the ingredients can be found in the recipe card at the bottom of this post.
Peel the potatoes and slice them thinly. I use a mandoline in order to give all the slices the same thickness, otherwise they won’t cook evenly. I slice the potatoes around 4 mm thick. Sprinkle the potato slices with pepper and salt. Cut the onions in half moons and mince the garlic.
Fry the bacon pieces to a crisp in a skillet on high heat. Don’t add any butter or oil, since the bacon fat will be enough. After 5 minutes, lower to medium heat and add the onions and garlic to the bacon. Brown the bacon, onions and garlic and after 5 minutes add the potato slices and fry for another 5 minutes. Pour a glass of white wine in to the mixture and simmer for 3 minutes. Pour a glass for yourself too.
Meanwhile, preheat the oven and pour the mixture into a preheated oven dish, or use the same skillet if it is oven proof. Cover the potato mix with aluminium foil. Don’t cover the whole dish, otherwise the mix will get too liquid. The purpose is so the potatoes can cook and steam slowly in the white wine and most of the liquid will be soaked up or slightly evaporated.
Check if the potatoes are almost ready after 30 minutes. Cover the dish with the cheese. What I do is slice the cheese in the middle, so you end up with two full size discs. Put the cheese with the crust facedown in the dish. This way the cheese does not disappear completely in the dish, but stays nicely on top and only seeps slightly through the potato mix. Put it back in the oven for another 10 minutes. Make sure the cheese is melted, has started bubbling and is slightly browned under the grill setting.
What to serve with tartiflette
Tartiflette is a pretty filling dish so it should best be served with some lighter side dishes. A nice green crisp salad, some pickled cornichons (gherkins) also go well with tartiflette. You can serve some french baguette to mop up the gooey cheese sauce and of course a good glass of dry white wine. Other side dishes that can be served are these Italian green beans, oven roasted fennel and carrots, shaved fennel salad or a refreshing tomato and onion salad.
Interested in more French recipes?
- Traditional French ratatouille
- Chicken Normandy or French apple cider chicken
- How to cook mussels mariniere
- Roasted chestnuts
- Chestnut and mushroom soup
French Tartiflette with reblochon cheese
Equipment
- Mandoline slicer
Ingredients
- 2 lbs (or 1 kg) potatoes peeled and thinly sliced
- 9 oz (or 250 g) bacon bits
- 2 medium onions cut into half moons
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- ⅔ cup (150 ml) white wine dry
- 1 Reblochon cheese
- 1 tablespoon sea salt
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- ½ teaspoon nutmeg freshly ground
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 175°C or 345°F
- Peel the potatoes and slice them by hand or with a mandoline to a thickness of 4 mm. Make sure all the slices have the same thickness. Add the salt and pepper to the potato slices.
- Fry the bacon pieces in a large skillet on high heat without adding oil or butter for 5 minutes. The bacon will release some of its fat to continue frying.
- Add the sliced onion and minced garlic to the bacon bits and continue browning the onions on medium heat for 3 minutes.
- Add the potato slices with the bacon and onion, mix properly and brown for 5 minutes on medium heat. Pour the white wine in to the mixture and let it simmer for 3 minutes.
- Pour the mixture in to a preheated oven dish (or use the same skillet if it can be used in the oven). Take some aluminium foil and cover the top of the mixture, but don't cover the whole dish, only the food.
- Put the oven dish in the preheated oven and let the potatoes cook or steam in the white wine for 30 minutes. If after 30 minutes the potatoes are still not soft enough, leave it for another 10 minutes in the oven.
- Slice the Reblochon cheese in half lengthwise, so you end up with 2 thinner full size discs.
- Place the cheese discs on top of the potato mixture, make sure most of it is covered. Place the crust of the cheese facedown.
- Increase the heat of the oven to 200°C or 395°F and put it on grill setting. Put it back in the oven for 10 minutes. The cheese needs to melt into the potato mixture and the top browned .
Notes
- I use waxy potatoes to make tartiflette, so the potato mixture stays firm enough when serving the tartiflette.
- Make sure to use dry white wine. I use quite a bit of white wine and let it evaporate a bit while cooking the potatoes on the stove and before placing them in the oven. I like the flavour of the wine, mixed with the melted cheese.
- Add enough salt and pepper. It’s difficult to add seasoning to the dish afterwards.
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OMG, that looks so good and I don’t think we have that cheese so definitely need to find a substitute
That cheese looks amazing. My husband cooks a similar dish at home, but this recipe looks super delicious! Will have to adapt without the bacon as we do not eat meat, but im sure it will still tastes amazing!
I love French Tartiflette. It’s one of my favorite dishes. The Reblochon cheese is amazing.
I am so making this. Any suggestions for Reblonchon cheese substitute though?
If you cannot use Reblochon cheese I would recommend using a brie or camembert cheese, or even raclette or a nice gruyere cheese. As long as it is a good flavoured cheese and it melts nicely over the potatoes and mixes with the white wine. It will be delicious 😉
Oh yes, this is so awesome especially during winter. Comfort food to warm you up…
I love French food. I grew up with French food since my country was a French colony.
I want to try this dish so bad! I’ll have to use Brie since there is no Reblochon cheese here, but I have to be careful not to use too much salt since the Brie is salty, and so is the bacon. I can’t wait to try it. Thank you so much for the recipe!
This tartiflette looks like something you’d want to eat on a snowy evening, somewhere in the mountains… so dreamy!
This recipe looks delicious and easy to prepare. I don’t have French food often and this sounds like a great one to begin eating more.
This looks amazing! You can’t go wrong with potato, onion and bacon. Add cheese and it’s pure heaven!