Before I moved to the United states of America, I did not have a big desire to try fondue, even though I love food. The main reason is because I am not a huge cheese fan. For those of you not familiar with the term ‘fondue’ - it is basically a way of dipping different foods into the sauce and eating it, and you can do it with either cheese or chocolate. Guess which one is more delicious. Hint: it starts with c and ends with hocolate.
One of the famous fondue restaurants in the United states of America is called The melting pot, and it offers quite an upscale dining experience. You can read more about my first experience with fondue in the post below. And hopefully, you will decide to try it someday.
Where is The melting pot situated and when to visit it?
The melting pot has several restaurants all over the United states of America, and, luckily for me, there is one in Dayton, where I currently live. It is situated on 453 Miamisburg - Centerville road, just a fifteen minute drive away from my house.
The busiest times to visit The melting pot (and I am talking about the one in Dayton here, not in general) are Friday and Saturday nights for obvious reasons. And since The melting pot is more of an upscale restaurant, you have to pay a little bit of attention to what you are wearing.
They are generally fine with jeans with holes, just do not wear sweat pants or anything too revealing. After all, you do not want to be sent back home at the door, after being very excited about dipping these strawberries into white chocolate and eating them afterwards, while the chocolate is still warm.
I would highly recommend you to make a reservation before heading to the restaurant. Because trust me, it is no fun if you arrive to the restaurant, already super hungry, and the hostess tells you that you have to wait an hour for the table. You do not need to make reservations a few days in advance - a few hours before your planned arrival is more than enough.
The menu
The melting pot menu consists of two parts - main courses and desserts. You also have an option of purchasing each fondue individually, or you can order the four course meal. The four course meal is a great option if you are there with at least three more people, because that is a lot of food.
The melting pot’s menu is very long, and it does not really make much sense to just write everything down here. Instead, I will just list the foods that I actually tried and liked. These are the things I would definitely recommend you to try:
Sesame crusted ahi tuna. This one sounds really good, and its preparation is even better. You will basically have to cook the tuna by yourself. When they bring the dish to you, the waiter or waitress will tell you how long you should dip the ahi tuna in the boiling water before eating it.
You have to be a little careful with this one - if you do not cook it long enough, there is a risk of getting salmonella. Unfortunately, they do not provide a timer (I was somehow imagining a cute sand clock.), but since everybody has smart phones nowadays, there should be no problem. You get six different dipping sauces with the tuna, and I loved all of them, except the blue cheese one.
Coconut curry shrimp. I love coconut shrimp, and I love curry, but when ordering this one, I was not sure whether these two will mix well together or not. But I was worried for no reason - this was my favourite of all the fondues I tried that day. Well, except for the chocolate ones.
You can not top a chocolate fondue. The only bad thing about the coconut curry shrimp fondue is dipping it into the cheese and getting it out in one piece. The coconut crust kept falling off, regardless on how hard I tried. Oh well, maybe I just need more practice - this was probably a sign that I need to eat at The melting pot more often.
Honey orange duck breast. I have never tried duck meat before that, and the only question I kept asking myself after trying it for the first time, is why. This one came with some special kind of Swiss cheese and I loved it. I mean, the duck meat tasted superb even by itself, but when you dip it in cheese, it tastes even better. You can taste the meat, the cheese and the orange flavour. The honey flavour somehow got lost after dipping it in cheese, but I prefer orange anyway.
And which chocolate fondues would I recommend? I cannot pick just one, but these were my absolute favourites:
Flaming turtle. Other than being delicious, the flaming turtle fondue is also a show for your eyes - it is flambeed (set on fire) and it tastes like chocolate and caramel. It takes a while for the flames to go out, and even longer for the chocolate to cool down enough to be good to eat, but it smells and tastes so good! The best things to dip in were marshmallows and strawberries. Dipping a banana in there will give it a funny taste. But it was still good.
Yin and Yang. You can guess from the name what this fondue looks like - it is a mix of white and dark chocolate, and every single thing I tried dipping in, turned out delicious. Even bananas. And if you order this fondue, try doing the following thing: dip whatever food you choose into white chocolate first, eat it, then try the same thing with the dark chocolate, and then, dip the food into both of them. Once you try it, you will understand!
Chocolate s’mores. Everybody loves s’mores. And the s’mores fondue are even better that actual s'mores. This fondue is made with milk chocolate, super sweet marshmallow liquid (well, more like foam) and graham crackers. The best thing to dip in this fondue are, of course, the marshmallows, and my second favourite thing for dipping were the strawberries. You can also dip pieces of chocolate in it for extra sweetness.
As for the drinks, The melting pot has all the usual drinks that you can also find in other restaurants. They have regular fountain drinks, and some pretty cool cocktails, but they are more expensive than I am usually willing to spend on a drink, so I did not try any. Maybe next time.
The fondue experience
One of the first things I noticed when entering The melting pot is how dark it is inside.
You might think that eating at The melting pot goes like this: you sit down, order, eat, pay and leave. But it is not that simple. The staff makes a whole presentation about the food you are about to eat, and it is actually pretty cool to watch. Unless you are starving and just want to eat, but you have no choice but to wait.
So, once you enter the restaurant, the hostess (or host) will walk you to your table. Then, he or she will bring the menus, explain how the fondue works, explain different types of cheeses and chocolates that you can combine during your experience, and so on. This alone will last around ten minutes.
Then, you can order drinks, and while the host or hostess will get them for you, you can look at the menu and decide what you want to try. Like I said, I have only been to The melting pot once with my friends, and we all tried each other’s food.
This is only one page of The melting pot's extensive menu list.
When your fondue is ready, the waiter or waitress will first explain how it works, and warn you multiple times that everything is hot and you can get burned. Well, this might seem obvious, but I almost (accidentally, of course) burned myself a few times when I was trying to get the coconut curry shrimp out of the cheese fondue.
You will get a special plate that is able to accommodate different dipping sauces and, of course, the main dish.
You will also be told proper way of cooking the foods if you ordered raw food, such as the sesame crusted ahi tuna fondue. Then, he or she will present the food on the table. And then, you are free to savour the food.
The raw tuna looks a little, well, raw, but once it is cooked, the meat gets that typical pink colour that we are used to seeing when someone mentions tuna.
Some of the dipping sauces.
The waiter or waitress will come back multiple times to check if everything tastes good and whether you need more food or fondue for dipping. All you need to do at the end of your meal is pay the bill. And then go home and rest because you will be too full to do anything productive for the rest of the day.
The price
I will be completely honest with you - when me and two of my best friends decided to give The melting pot a try, we did not check the prices beforehand, simply because one of these friends heard that The melting pot is an affordable fondue restaurant. And when we got there and I saw all the fancy dressed people, it did not ring any bells that this might be a pretty pricey meal.
So I pretty much gasped when I got the check - a drink (and it was non - alcoholic), half a cheese fondue, and twice the chocolate fondue, shared with my friend, cost me fifty five dollars (well, in fact, it was seventy, because of the mandatory tip).
To make your experience more delicious (and more expensive, of course), you can try different cooking styles, and each one costs an additional seven dollars. I will try one of these next time I visit the Melting pot.
Do not get me wrong, I do not regret eating at The melting pot at all - it was delicious and it was a totally new experience for me. And it is not like I am eating there every week - once in a while, I deserve to treat myself to a fancier meal. Because, you know, you only live once, and you will regret things you did not do and try more than the ones you did and did not turn out the way you expected.
Birthday offers
In one of my previous blog posts, I have already mentioned that many of the restaurants in the United states of America offer discounts or free food on your birthday. And good news is that The melting pot is not an exception. Their birthday offer is a box of six chocolate covered strawberries (they are delicious).
The catch here is that you have to actually eat a meal at The melting pot to be eligible for that offer, but the offer is valid for two months after your birthday, so you have some time to decide if you want that gift or not. (But of course you do. Why would you say no to chocolate covered strawberries?)
When making a dining reservation, you have to tell them that you would like to redeem your birthday offer when eating there. Why? Simply because they prepare these chocolate covered strawberries freshly every day. And you can even choose if you want them dipped into white, regular or dark chocolate. Or a mix of all of them.
The strawberries come in a nice gift box, and I was actually thinking to give them to my friend, whose birthday was coming up, but then I decided against it, because the strawberries just looked too good to be given away. And, as selfish as I might sound, I am glad I ate them by myself. They were just so good!
A few words for the end...
If you would like to try something different and/or treat yourself and a couple of friends for a special occasion, I would definitely suggest you to try out the Melting pot. Fondue is an experience on its own and their food is delicious. And just a friendly tip for the very end - be careful not to burn yourself on the fondue pots or on the fire underneath them - they are hot!
