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January 28, 2005
Alpage Prattigau
Pressed cow milk cheese from Switzerland. Pretty substantial. For some reason it tastes really good with a hearty bread, like a dense freshly-baked rye bread. Good with apples or something similarly sweet on the side.
Murray's Cheese's description:
A cooked, pressed, and washed raw cow's milk cheese from the base of teh Prattigau Valley in Switzerland, with an herbaceous, full flavor. Made in the traditional apenzeller style and aged for a period of six months. Nutty overtones with a delicate hint of fresh nectarines, with age turns into an aromatic, concentrated, Swiss powerhouse.
This cheese has a rind that you obviously don't eat. However, the cheese close to the rind is more solidified and crumbly. The cheese on the verge of the rind is definitely different from the delicious succulent middle. Is there a phrase in the cheese world to designate the closeness to the rind? "She's living dangerously" => "She's on the cheese rind." Hmmm, maybe this has other connotations I am not thinking of.
Posted by maggie at 01:16 PM | Comments (0)
January 16, 2005
Birthday Party with Cheese
My birthday party featured lots of wonderful cheese-related events.
First, as a gift I received a huge slate board for serving cheese. It is about 2.5 feet wide and about a foot deep. it displays up to five cheeses in a spectacular fashion. Another gift was a slightly smaller metal cheese board, one of its great features being a cheese slicer - a thin wire allows cheese to be sliced into ultra thinness. I am now prepared for the cheese expert endeavor!
Now, cheese: lots of cheeses were featured, however, the one that stood up the most was gjetost cheese (Ski Queen brand). Gjetost cheese is a Norwegian cheese made from both goat and cow milk. It looks like a brick of caramel and it tastes like it as well. This is due to cooking the milk until the sugars in it caramelize during the cheese making process. Gjetost is sweet and rich and would probably taste best with dark bread, served as a dessert or snack. Just watch out - the smell of it will linger on your fingers for a really long time!
Posted by maggie at 11:29 PM | Comments (0)
January 05, 2005
Bingham Hill's Harvest Moon & Abbaye de Citeaux
Last night was a first cheese combination evening. I decided to try two cheeses, which (as recommended by the cheese seller, Murray's Cheese) would go well together. Both soft cow-milk cheeses, very delicious and very filling as dinner (served on baguette with olives on the side).
Bingham Hill's Harvest Moon
This beautiful cheese from Tom and Kristi Johnson in Colorado is made from raw cow's milk and has the full, salty flavor of a great Tallesio, but it is uniquely gentle. The cheese we have today is made to a new and improved recipe and this sassy, aromatic, creamy treasure has only gotten better. (from Murray's Cheese label)
I don't know how I feel about describing cheese as "sassy", but I tell you this, it was pretty good. It smells a lot and it stank up the living room, but it was a quite pleasant sort of smell - very strong, but definitely recognizable as cheese as opposed to some other cheeses that smell like something died in your fridge.
Abbaye de Citeaux
One fo the triumverate of Burgundian washed rinds, alone with Epoisse and L'Ami du Chambertain. Raw cow's milk, made by a single monastery (abbaye) in Burgundy. Very rare, highly seasonal, Abbaye de Citeaux is similar to Reblochon, with a deeper, more buttery flavor. (from Murray's Cheese label)
I'm reading Cheese Primer by Steven Jenkins and he points out two things. One: whether to eat the rind of the cheese is a personal choice (except for the obviously gross rinds). It looks like I am a rind-eater. I think the rind adds a bit of texture variety to the cheese consumed. Two: cheeses are seasonal and the season depends on when the grasses that the cows/sheep/yaks/whatever eat are in their prime. This usually occurs in July and August (at least for the northern hemisphere) so the cheese's best season is July/August plus amount of time it takes for the cheese to, well, become cheese.
Overall, these two cheeses made a delicious combo. Abbaye de Citeaux is less stinky but its flavor is richer than that of the Harvest Moon, so they balanced out each other rather well.
P.S. I will be adding categories under New Cheese organizing cheeses by milk (cow, goat, etc.). I will add new milks as I try them.
Posted by maggie at 10:51 AM | Comments (0)