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This page contains an archive of all entries posted to 365 Cheeses in the P category. They are listed from oldest to newest.
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Many more can be found on the main index page or by looking through the archives.
© 2008 Kirk Samuels
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P Archives
Mario Batali and others call it "the undisputed King of Cheeses"--Parmigiano Reggiano. I would not agree with the undisputed part--I do know some Frenchmen and this cheese isn't French--but I do say yes to its royal pedigree. Most often used grated or shredded because of its granular texture, grana, parmigiano is great shaved thin to top salads and pasta or broken into small shards for a cheese plate.
The first comment I thought I would write about this majestic cheese is the taste of salt. After all, it is used time and again to punch up other tastes with its saltiness. But tasting parmigiano again and alone, I was surprised that salt was not the first flavor on my tongue. First comes the texture. The peaks of the granules brush the tongue and the sides of my mouth. Then the taste buds around my tounge perk up. I sense the sweetness of milk. Then the tang of a cheese like Swiss Emmentaler followed by a slight nuttiness. Only then does the saltiness emerge. Occassionaly my tooth will hit a grain of saltier, harder cheese tucked into a larger bite.
Like a lot of Americans my first experience of "parmesan cheese" came out of a green cardboard can with a yellow smiling top. When my family had spaghetti with store-bought sauce we always topped it with the yellowy-white cheese. I liked it but then I didn't know any better. After tasting the real thing I could never go back. (That's not 100% true. I promise I will never buy the stuff but if I am visiting my parents and we eat spaghetti at home, there is a nice nostalgic comfort in the combination of Ragu and Kraft Parmesan, much like the affection I will always have for Kraft Macaroni & Cheese Dinner--not the best of its kind but a comfort from childhood.)
I have tried Argentinian "parmesan" and it can be an adequete substitute in cooked dishes. But its texture is worlds apart from the true thing. It lacks the marble-like layers of grana that flake away when cutting into real parmigiano.
Try the big PR, Parmigano Reggiano. Truly one of the world's best.
Name: Parmigano Reggiano
Type of Milk: Cow, Part Skim, Unpasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in: Italy, Emilia-Romagna
Date Produced: Unknown
Date Purchased: 10/23/2006
Date Eaten: 10/24/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $15.99/lb.
The difference between young provolone and aged is the difference between Beaujolais Nouveau and ten-year-old Port, between an '87 Mustang and a '64, between Brittany Spears and Ella Fitzgerald. Age and experience can be wonderful things. This aged provolone, labeled "piccante”, is not so much spicy or sharp like an aged cheddar but piquant in the tangy sense.
The name "provolone" may be derived from the Naples’s dialect for "globe" since one of the traditional shapes for this cheese was a round ball. Now it is most often seen in a large sausage-like shape. The texture has concentric onion-like layers that you can peel away, much like a fresh mozzarella ball. This is not surprising since provolone is the older brother of the mozzarella family. Take a fresh ball of mozzarella, hang it by string in a cool, dry room and rub the surface with salt water for the first few days. After a few months you have provolone. Auricchio, the manufacturer of this cheese, has been making it since 1877.
Serve it sliced or in chunks on an antipasto platter.
This is a wonderful cheese for cooking. It makes a great addition to a grilled cheese sandwich or to top salads or pasta.
Name: Auricchio Provolone
Type of Milk: Cow, Pasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in:Italy, Auricchio Company
Date Produced: Unknown
Date Purchased: 10/23/2006
Date Eaten: 10/24/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $14.99/lb.
Port Salut is what I call a breakfast cheese. Soft, mild, inexpensive but still fresh tasting, it is not a great cheese but it is a great way to start the day. I love a slice with toast and jam (raspberry is my favorite).
Port Salut has a distinctive orange rind beneath an orange paper label. This is edible (the rind, not the paper) but don't. Stick to the white, milky soft cheese. The name comes from the trappist abbey of Notre Dame du Port du Salut (Our Lady of the Port of Salvation). I don't think this cheese will get you into heaven but it will keep you satisfied until lunch.
Name: Port Salut
Type of Milk: Cow, Pasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in: France, Brittany
Date Produced: Unknown
Date Purchased: 11/04/2006
Date Eaten: 11/08/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $7.99/lb.
I once heard Parrano described as a Dutch cheese with an Italian accent, or maybe it was an Italian cheese with a Dutch accent. Either way, it's an accurate description for a cheese from the Netherlands named for an Etruscan village. Think Gouda mixed with Parmesan. Parrano is a versatile cheese that I reach for when I want flavor for not a high cost. After reaching for the cheese I usually reach for the grater.
Ways I use grated Parrano:
Macaroni and Cheese
Grilled Cheese (two no brainers)
Omelets
Topping Duck Confit, Roasted Garlic and Arugula Pizza
Name: Parrano
Type of Milk: Cow, Pasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Netherlands
Date Produced: Unknown
Date Purchased: 11/04/2006
Date Eaten: 11/08/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $7.99/lb.
"Ow, we want the funk.
Give up the funk.
Ow, we need the funk.
We gotta have that funk."
-George Clinton and Parliament-Funkadelic
Here is a cheese with funk. You will either love it or ask that it be removed from the room while you have the whole house fumigated to remove its foul stench. I lean toward the love side. My fiancée Fleming leans toward the hazmat suit.
Petit Munster Géromé, "little Gerry" to his friends, is a complex cheese with complex flavors. Others have described it as “earthy” “with a strong farmyard aroma”. That is a polite way to put it. I can do little to fully describe it other than say it is reminiscent of certain bodily fluids.
The outer rind is an orangey slick paste that surrounds a four-inch disk. Inside is the pale yellow cheese that packs a wicked punch. I have found that many of the ripened cheeses have a noxious odor immediately after unwrapping them. Let them sit unwrapped for 10 to 15 minutes and let them breathe out this unpleasantness. Little Gerry still holds on to other odors but these can be your friends if you don't mind having French friends who smell like they never shower. Cut out a small wedge and spread it on some fresh bread. I enjoyed the complexity of flavors. Fleming said it started out good but had an evil finish.
Be bold and give it a try!
Name: Petit Munster Géromé
Type of Milk: Cow, Pasteurized
Type: Soft
Produced in: France, Jean Rousset Fromager
Date Produced: Unknown
Date Purchased: 11/17/2006
Date Eaten: 11/18/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $17.99/lb.
Piave is named after the Piave River Valley of northern Italy where it is produced. It is made from part-skim pasturized cow's milk like many other hard cheeses. The cows are milked twice daily. Whole milk from the first milking is used as well as milk whose cream has been skimmed from the evening milking. Piave when aged is a sweeter cousin of the parmesan family. Look for a waxy rind and the "PIAVE" name imprinted on the edges.
Like other hard Italian cheeses it can be grated over pasta or vegetables or shaved on salads or bread. It may be a poor man's Parmesan but that poor man will not be deprived and will eat well tonight.
Name: Piave, Aged
Type of Milk: Cow, Pasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in:
Date Purchased: 10/23/2006
Date Eaten: 10/24/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $7.99/lb.
Pecorino Romano is one of the gratable, hard sheep's milk cheeses of Italy. Pecorino is devrived from "pecora", the Italin word for sheep. My go-to Italian sheep's milk cheese for pasta is Pecarino Locatelli, but the Romano stands up to it. The cheese has a nice sheep's milk flavor. It is a little more moist than Locatelli, but that may be the age of this particular piece. Its flavor is not as salty, not as sharp. The color is a paler shade of white. A good cheese. By the real thing. Buy it whole, never grated.
Name: Pecorino Romano
Type of Milk: Sheep, Pasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in: Italy
Date Purchased: 10/23/2006
Date Eaten: 10/24/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $6.99/lb.
Locatelli is a brand of Pecorini Romano cheese distinguished by its dark brown rind, pale yellow color and sharp, salty flavor. It is my go-to grating cheese and one of two kinds I almost always have in the house (Parmigiano Reggiano the other). I almost always use it in combination with Parmigiano.
Name: Locatelli Pecorino Romano
Type of Milk: Sheep, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in:
Date Purchased: 11/25/2006
Date Eaten: 11/28/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, A Southern Season
Price: $10.99/lb.
Grana is one of the best cheeses in the world. I would go so far as to say that I prefer it to Parmigiano Reggiano. I love it. I eat it by itself more often than dilluted in recipes. Seek out this cheese and buy it. It may not be a staple of your cheese shop but often during the holidays, especially those celebrated large by Italians around the world, the special cheeses are brought out. I first had it a dozen Christmases ago at the home of an Italian friend. Her mother brought/smuggled it from Italy and my first thought was, "Wow, this is the best Parmigiano I've ever had!" Turned out it was Grana Padano and this year I saw it in my local store for the first time. This is a special cheese.
Name: Grana Padano Trentino
Type of Milk: Cow, Pasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in: Italy
Date Purchased: 11/25/2006
Date Eaten: 11/28/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, A Southern Season
Price: $16.99/lb.
Plassas is an odd cheese. It is either very new to the cheese world or not highly thought of, since I found not a single mention of it in any of the cheese books I own nor did the Internet turn up much other than a photo of the cheese on the manufacturer's web site. If the cheese is not well thought of I understand why.
First off Plassas is the opposite of salty, which mainly means "bland". It taste like some kind of cheese that was specially designed to be good for you, possibly made out of yoghurt or tofo, but the label assures us it is made from normal pasteurized cow's milk. The texture is dry and chewy. I really didn't like this cheese. If it was made to be healthy it won't help since I don't plan on eating it again. Maybe that was the intent.
Name: Plassas
Type of Milk: Sheep, Pasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Italy, Santa Marina Formaggi
Date Purchased: 12/8/2006
Date Eaten: 12/9/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, A Southern Season
Price: $12.99/lb.
If Parmigiano-Reggiano is the King of Cheeses, Parmigiano-Reggiano Vacche Rosse is the Emperor. Made from a once near-extinct breed of red dairy cows, the Reggiana, Vacche Rosse tastes the way the cheese did in the days before World War II, richer, higher butter-fat content grana cheese produced in smaller batches. Can I taste the difference between modern Parmigiano-Reggiano made from more productive black and whites and the red cow product? It is hard to say. Red cow is damn fine. As wonderful as every other properly handled Parmigiano. Yes, I will say it is better. But...
Red Cow is expensive. I mean the most expensive cheese I've ever paid for, and there weren't any truffles or Sauterne inside. At Christmas time sales I found it for $31.99 per pound, well twice what I'd pay for a standard Parmigiano-Reggiano. Unless it's a very special occassion, like Christmas or the day I win the lottery, I will stick to the normal Parmigiano-Reggiano.
Name: Parmigiano-Reggiano Vacche Rosse, Parmigiano-Reggiano delle Vacche Rosse, Red Cow Parmesan Reggiano
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in:
Date Purchased: 12/22/2006
Date Eaten: 12/23/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $31.99/lb.
Twenty-seven dollars and ninety-nine cents per pound! Costing as much as some aged prime rib, Piacentinu had better be a spectacular cheese. Sadly it is not. The high price is due in part to one of its ingredients, wild saffron, one of the world's most expensive spices. Saffron gives this pecorino a rich golden yellow color and whole peppercorns add the Dalmatian-like speckles. Basically this is bright yellow pecorino cheese from Sicily. The taste is not greatly improved by the pepper or crocus stigma. I can't think of a reason to buy it again.
Name: Piacentinu or Piacentino
Type of Milk: sheep's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Italy, Sicily
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $27.99/lb.
The first lady of Dutch cheeses may have an Italian name. Prima Donna belongs to the gouda family and bears enough age not to be silly yet is young enough to leave you wanting more of her. It comes at a decent price and the flavor it offers can be put to use in a variety of dishes from pizza to pasta to eggs to potatoes. I like it.
Name: Prima Donna
Type of Milk: cow's milk, pasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: The Netherlands
Date Purchased: 2/13/2007
Date Eaten: 2/15/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $11.99/lb.
Yes, it's a cute little white pyramid, pleasingly packaged in bleached waxed paper, calling out from behind the glass display cooler with puppy-dog eyes that say, "Take me home." But this is not just a cute pound puppy, it's a rich pedigree of traditionally hand crafted cheese of the finest order.
Unwrapping the cheese from it's paper, you discover not a pure white coat (unless you are taking it home very young and fresh, maybe a little under-ripened) but a palette of white and grays, tans and creams, painting the bloomy rind. Do not cut into the cheese until it has had some time out at room temperature. Ten to fifteen minutes should do. Once warmed up a little cut off one of the pyramid's four sides to expose the golden treasure of the pharaohs. The flavor and texture show the age of this adolescent goat cheese. Ripe, it will run a little around the edges and have a little sweetness on its way to richer depths. A very good cheese and for the price worth buying often. Try slices of this delicious chevre with crisp apples or even on top of a burger off the grill. Can pair well with Sauvignon Blanc if you favor drier wines or a Riesling if in a sweeter mood. Cypress Grove Chevre are the same folks who bring us another of my favorite cheeses, Humboldt Fog.
Name: Cypress Grove Chevre's Pee Wee Pyramid or Pee Wee Pyramid
Type of Milk: goat's, pasteurized
Type: bloomy rind, soft
Produced in: United States of America, California, Cypress Grove Chevre
Date Purchased: 7/2/2007
Date Eaten: 7/4/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $7.99 each
Imagine, if you will, a school. An elite school. In the northern Italian countryside, this school takes in the children of only two families. But this school is even more exclusive than that. Not every child of these two families is invited to attend. Only the best and brightest are accepted and not all of students will make it through the rigorous process to graduation. The school is G. Cravero in the town of Bra in Piedmont and the students belong to the cheese families Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano. (No jokes about the milk products that come from Bra or I will keep you after class.) G. Cravero was named in 1855 after the founder Giorgio Cravero whose descendants keep the "G" in the family by naming a son Giorgio or Giacomo, alternating with each generation. They do not produce the cheese; they select the best and mature it in ideal surroundings until it has reached its height.
I have written about Parmigiano Reggiano twice before (cheese no. 1 and 53). How does Cravero's Parmigiano Reggiano compare to others I've tasted? First the texture is the perfect texture for PR. Not too dry so that it still has a great mouth feel but still aged enough so that it shreads well over pasta. The taste was not like other PRs I've encountered. To say it tasted a little like pineapple may sound pretentious, like a wine snob comparing a glass to a everything but grapes, but that was the first word that popped in my head at first bite. Slightly sweet with a detectablt level of acidity. Pineapple. One of my favorite fruits and a welcome flavor here. Pineapple is a symbol of hospitality afterall. For a price between the average PR and the top-of the-chart PR Vacche Rosse, Cravero was my favorite of the three.
Name: Parmigiano Reggiano, Cravero or Cravero Parmigiano Reggiano
Type of Milk: cow's, pasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in: Italy
Date Purchased: 9/28/07
Date Eaten: 10/01/07
Purchased Where: online, www.artisanalcheese.com
Price: $20.00/lb.
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