What To Drink With Your Fondue

Posted By elissa on Dec 15, 2010 | 1 comment

I couldn’t resist this paper (and accompanying video) published in the Christmas edition of the British Medical Journal: “Effect on gastric function and symptoms of drinking wine, black tea, or schnapps with a Swiss cheese fondue: randomised controlled crossover trial.” It’s one of those classic, tongue-in-cheek writeups that’s intended to be humorous, yet provides a pretty good “look behind the scenes” at how scientific data is collected and assessed.

The vid is rather droll – scientists are human, after all. The conclusion, not surprisingly, was that drinking alcohol with fondue significantly slowed gastric emptying, although it was not associated with dyspeptic symptoms.

Actually, this is semi-relevant to me, as I always make an assortment of hors d’oeuvres for Christmas Eve (it’s tradition!), and this year, fondue is on the menu. I won’t be drinking tea with it, either. Guess I’ll just have to keep it to a few bites, so I don’t end up with a “cheese baby.” 😉