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This page contains an archive of all entries posted to 365 Cheeses in the Unpasteurized category. They are listed from oldest to newest.
Sheep's Milk is the previous category.
Many more can be found on the main index page or by looking through the archives.
© 2008 Kirk Samuels
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Unpasteurized 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.
I had never heard of Crucolo before buying it. After tasting it I was glad I picked it up.
One online source describes the flavor "resembling Parmegiano-Reggiano" but "with a creamy texture". In my mind it was closer to an Emmentaler or mild gruyere in taste and texture, not really creamy at all. Nice tang. It has a milky pale color and small holes throughout.
A delicious cheese.
Name: Crucolo
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in:Italy, Trentino-Alto Adige
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: $17.99/lb.
Eating mold can be a tricky thing. There is a fine blue line between a perfectly ripe cheese and one that has gone on to wilder pastures. Cheese is a living food--not the kind with a heartbeat but one that ages and changes and goes through a life cycle. I tasted the cheese I'm writing about today, Fourme d'Ambert au lait cru, twice. Not different pieces either but the same chunk. Each time was at a different stage of the cheese's life and a vastly different experience.
The name is a little pretentious if you don't know French. "Fourme" comes from the Latin word for "form", a in which the cow's milk curds were held or pressed. The Italian word for cheese itself, "formaggio", has the same origin. In some French dialects "fourme" simply means cheese. So Fourme d'Ambert is cheese that originated in the town of Ambert. "Au lait cru" means "from raw milk" or unpasteurized. It is a blue cheese, a moldy molded cheese of France.
Fourme' d'Ambert is often called French Stilton. The grayish-green veins of blue mold run thick throughout. When I bought it, the cheese was cut to order (a good sign) and wrapped in cheese paper instead of plastic (a very good sign). When I opened it the next day after bringing the cheese to room temperature for an hour the texture was moist but still crumbled when cut. Spread on a cracker it was creamy and sweet yet pungent with the blue cheese flavor. Strong but not overpowering. It was a delicious cheese. My fiancée Fleming and I ate half of it then I wrapped it in plastic and returned it to the refrigerator.
Three days later I took the cheese and a few crackers with me to work for my lunch. By the time I unwrapped the cheese it had been at room temperature for a few hours. The smell, fungal and overpowering, almost knocked me out my chair. This was not the same cheese I had eaten days before. Undeterred by the pungency I cut of a chuck and spread it on a cracker. Even before it reached my mouth I could feel the fumes of something--mold maybe--entering my nose. The creaminess and sweet milk flavors were gone, consumed by the living cultures that had taken over. I ate the last of it but it left a bad taste in my nose and mouth.
Lesson: Cheese or any great food product must be taken care of properly and prepared and served at the peak of ripeness or freshness. Buying in bulk, even a bulk of two servings, may be fine for some ingredients, but not all and especially not some really great cheeses.
Name: Fourme D'Ambert Au Lait Cru
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in: France
Date Produced: Unknown
Date Purchased: 10/23/2006
Date Eaten: 10/24/2006, 10/30/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $9.99/lb.
Schwing!
Entelbucher Schwingerkäse comes from the Swiss town of Entelbuch in the Canton of Lucerne. Entelbuch is probably most famous for a breed of cattle dog called the Entelbucher Sennenhund or simply the Entelbucher. I'm not sure what the actual translation of "Schwingerkäse" would be in English, maybe "swing cheese". The verb "schwingen" means to swing or to beat or to oscillate. The name may come from some production process that involes beating or swinging the cheese around or may be named after someone named "Schwing". My research uncovered no origins for the name. "Käse", pronounced kay-za, is the German word for cheese.
The cheese is similar in flavor, color and texture to what we most think of as "Swiss cheese". It lacks the sharpness of a Gruyère or Emmentaler but has the same undertones of flavor and notes of fresh bread. The color is a very pale whitish yellow and there are only a few small holes.
It's a good cheese but the price is steep and not one I'd recommend when its equals can be found much cheaper.
Name: Entelbucher Schwingerkäse
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Switzerland, Tirol, Spezialitätenkäserei Doppleschwand AG
Date Produced: Unknown
Date Purchased: 10/23/2006
Date Eaten: 10/24/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, A Southern Season
Price: $21.99/lb.
I bought this cheese because it was different and because I didn't think I would like it. Not liking it would give me more to write. What made this cheese different and something I thought I would not like? Pine.
Chapel Hill Creamery's Hickory Grove cheese is a monastery-style (unpasteurized) cheese that has been flavored by pine needles. The faint green imprints of them can be seen on the hardened rind. Pine? In cheese? Made me think of Pinesol, not parmesan. But I gave it an honest try.
I liked it. Hickory Grove has a unique flavor. Slightly vegetal. Milder than I expected. A little tangy. It reminded me a little of retsina, the Greek wine flavored with pine resin, but not as strong. I has a pleasant unique flavor and will make a great addition to a holiday cheese tray.
Name: Hickory Grove
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: USA, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill Creamery
Date Purchased: 11/17/2006
Date Eaten: 11/18/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $17.99/lb.
Here is a wonderful cheese from the Italian Alps, Fontina Valle d'Aosta. Another of my favorites. True fontina has great natural flavor, the good tastes and odors of the farm--hay, grass, milk, straw, air. The alpine Italians have been producing it for hundreds of years. Look for the name on the cheese paper or the blue Matterhorn stamp to get the real thing.
Fontina Valle d'Aosta melts well (think baked pastas or on warm bread) but is delicious at room temperature with a hearty red wine and sliced salumi.
Name: Fontina Valle d'Aosta, DOP
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Italy
Date Purchased: 11/23/2006
Date Eaten: 11/23/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $14.99/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.
Perhaps the number one question I hear people ask when served a soft, ripened cheese is, "Should I eat the rind?" My answer is "Sure, if you want to. But if you don't want, that's okay too." Taleggio is one of those soft cheeses and its rind can be a little intimidating. Usually you will find it cut from a square cheese into triangular pieces, giving it two fresh-cut, exposed sides. As Taleggio ripens it will soften and "melt" from these sides. For the mildest cheese, cut off the cheese the seeps from the sides and spread it on fresh bread or apple or pear. If you’re more daring start at the exposed point and cut all the way into the cheese to get a sandwich of soft cream between crusts of white rind. This delivers more aroma and stronger flavors. If it proves too much, go back to scraping out the milder Taleggio interior. If you enjoy it, keep working toward the wall of white-orange-blue outer rind until you can go no further. Remember though, you should not eat the paper label or the synthetic rind or any cheese, unless you're an omnivorous goat.
Taleggio dates back to before the 10th century and may be one of the oldest soft ripened cheeses. I love it. It is available both in a raw milk (unpasteurized) form as well as pasteurized. In general a raw milk cheese is undoubtedly better, more complex, more interesting.
Name: Raw Milk Taleggio
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: soft
Produced in: Italy
Date Purchased: 12/4/2006
Date Eaten: 12/5/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $11.99/lb.
I am wrapping up a fifteen-in-a-row Italian cheese spree with Montasio Vecchio. "Vecchio" is Italin for "old" and this cheese from Friuli gets better with age. (An even older form bears the name "Stravecchio".) Aged but not crumbly Montasio shares flavors with parmesan and cheddar but texture a little like aged provolone. The taste has a hint of smoke that may come with age or improper storage in its life but not to bad effect. A delightful cheese.
Name: Montasio Vecchio
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Italy
Date Purchased: 12/06/2006
Date Eaten: 12/08/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $13.99/lb.
Yes! This Red Leicester is a beautful cheese and so far my favorite new cheese I discovered this year. Not too sharp. Perfect bite. Lingering flavors of delicious cheese. Port wine flavors. "Addictive and distinctive" says Fleming. "Not a phony cheddar, it tastes like what cheese should taste like--really great cheese!" I agree.
Seek this cheese out this holiday season. You will be hooked.
Name: Rothbury Red Leicester
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: England, Rothbury
Date Purchased: 12/082006
Date Eaten: 12/09/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $15.99/lb.
Farmhouse cheddars are some of may favorite cheeses. "Farmhouse" typically means two things: the milk is unpasteurized and comes from the milking herd of a single farm. This kind of cheddar produces complex flavors with distinctive farmyard flavors. It is hard to really describe "farmyard flavors" if you've never set foot on a farm but if you have and try this cheese it will bring back many different sense memories. Milk, of course. Hay, straw, grass. Earthy tones. Musky, leathery cow aromas that are not unpleasant to the initiated.
The cheese I recently tasted had some onion- and chive-like flavors that are supposedly not a good sign according to the cheese books. Still I did not think it spoiled the taste and and just added to the layers of complex flavor. Fleming commented that this cheddar packed a ""one-two punch, both punches equally delicious".
I recommend this cheese though serve it in small amounts. A little goes a long way.
Name: Goulds English Farmhouse Cheddar
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: England, Somerset, EFJ Gould & Co.
Date Purchased: 12/08/2006
Date Eaten: 12/09/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $13.99/lb.
Comté is a delicious cheese from eastern France. It is a French Gruyère which is to say, a French Swiss Cheese. Comté has wonderful unique flavors of the Gruyère family, that sharp twang of Swiss that tingle the roof of your mouth. Nice nutty flavors. Center cuts are the best value. Look for only two of the six faces to have inedible rind. I found it on sale for the holidays so look for it in your local food marts.
Name: Comté or Comte or Gruyère de Comté
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: France, Franche-Comté
Date Purchased: 12/04/2006
Date Eaten: 12/05/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Food
Price: $10.99/lb.
First thing I noticed about this Goosnargh Gold Double Gloucester cheese is how good looking it is. What a handsome cheese. It looks like a solid, fine, upstanding, leading-man cheese. The marbled brown outer rind fading into a rich orange, layered center. Nice.
Double Gloucester comes from only whole milk wheres his little brother, Single Gloucester is produced from skimmed milk and served a little younger. Both come from the English county of Gloucestershire and were originally made solely from the milk of Glouster cattle, a breed that almost went extinct.
The taste is delicious. Earthy, complex, but still mild.
Name: Goosnargh Gold Double Gloucester
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: England, Gloucestershire
Date Purchased: 12/08/2006
Date Eaten: 12/09/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $/lb.
The first thing you notice about Morbier is the line throught the middle? What is it? It's not a blue-gray mold found in the bleu cheeses. It is a layer of ash. Ok, so what's the deal with ash?
Well, Morbier comes from the eponymous French village in Franche-Comté and traditionally was made in two stages. The first was from morning milk and the second was from the evening milking. To protect the morning cheese from flies throughout the day, a layer of ash was put on top. The ash has little or no flavor. The phrase "au lait cru" indicates the cheese is made from raw, unpasteurized milk.
Morbier has a distinct appearance and pleasing flavor. You taste the rawnees of the milk without it being too funky or strong. Nice creaminess and bite. A wonderful cheese.
Name: Morbier Au Lait Cru
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in: France, Franche-Comté, Morbier
Date Purchased: 12/08/2006
Date Eaten: 12/19/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $/lb.
The Borough Market is London's oldest farmers' market, selling organic produce, artisinal food products and farmhouse cheeses. This wonderful Stilton from Neal's Yard Dairy is named after and often sold in that market. Like all Stilton, Borough Market is a blue cheese made from cow's milk curd that have been injected with Penicillium cultures of mold to produce blue-green-gray veins. The texture of the cheese itself is firm and almost cheddar-like, though not too dry. Like other blues, this one pairs perfectly with sweet white wines, walnuts, and arboreal fruit. Stilton is the King of British Cheeses and like the magi traditionally sows up around Christmas. Hope you find some Borough Market Stilton in your Christmas stocking beside the fruit and nuts.
Name: Borough Market Stilton
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: England, Neal's Yard Dairy
Date Purchased: 12/22/2006
Date Eaten: 12/25/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $11.99/lb.
When one of my local cheese sources was out of Stilton before Christmas, they immediately suggested an alternative blue cheese, Whitestone Windsor Blue Cheese from New Zealand. It is is soft, almost creamy cheese with blue-gray tubes of mold. A really delicious cheese, though a bit expensive. Save it for a special occassion or for when your shop is out of Stilton.
Name: Whitestone Windsor Blue Cheese
Type of Milk: Cow, Pasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: New Zealand
Date Purchased: 12/22/2006
Date Eaten: 12/25/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $26.99/lb.
I have to admit that I mistakenly called Fiscalini San Joaquin a Spanish cheese right up until I googled it a few minutes ago. Fiscalini sounds like an Italian accountant but is Fiscalini Farms in Modesto, California and the saint name comes from the San Joachin Valley in central California.
The cheese is wonderful with a buttery baked potato color and gratable firm texture. The flavor resembles the grana cheese like parmesan but hints of the softer fontina.
Name: Fiscalini San Joaquin Gold
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in: United States
Date Purchased: 12/22/2006
Date Eaten: 12/23/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Raleigh, Whole Foods
Price: $14.99/lb.
Modern Esrom is the reinvention of the cheese that went extinct in the 16th century. Named for an abbey in Nordseeland Denmark, the Trappist-style, raw milk cheese died out after the monastary that made it was closed in 1559. After the Second World War, cheese scientists somehow believed they had recreated it. Whether they had detailed recipes to produce it or had bits of 400 year-old cheese lying about to sample is doubtful. Most likely they had a short description of this pungent wash-rind cheese and came up with a suitable stand-in.
The taste is not my favorite. The smell is a little strong, like Limberger, but the flavor is less funky though still strong. A little oniony. The texture is semi-soft with holes like Havarti.
Name: Esrom or Esrum
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in: Denmark
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $8.99/lb.
Literally meaning "herdsman's cheese" Hirtenkäse is wonderful cow's milk cheese from the Allgäu regionof southern Germany. One reason for the name and the brilliant flavor is the cows that produce its milk are all fresh grass fed. No sileage is fed to the herd during the cheese producing months. The texture is a little granular with an aged provolone/parmesan taste. Very delicious.
Name: Hirtenkäse
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in: Germany
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $15.99/lb.
The name "Appenzeller" can refer to the people of the Appenzell region of Switzerland, or, like Entelbucher, a breed of Swiss cattle herding dog (the Appenzeller Sennenhund), or a 700 year-old type of Swiss cheese. Along with Emmentaler and Gruyere, Appenzeller stands in the triumvirate of Swiss cheeses. Over 70 Swiss dairies produce versions of this cheese and it appears in many fondue recipes, either by itself or alongside its partners.
The age of a particular Appenzeller can often be determined by its name or the color of its label:
- A silver label, like the one I tried, designates a cheese aged three to four months before shipping and may be labeled "Classic".
- A gold or wheat colored label, named "Surchoix", French for "top choice", is the penultimate level of aging, from four to six months.
- Appenzeller aged longer than six months will bare a black label with the word "Extra" imprinted on it.
(Note that these terms for aging apply only to Appenzeller. For example "Surchoix" for the Gruyère from Roth Käse Diary in Wisconsin is aged nine months.)
The more age Appenzeller has the sharper and stronger the flavor.
We used it in fondue on New Year's Eve and its was delicious.
Name: Appenzeller
Type of Milk: Cow, Unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Switzerland
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $14.99/lb.
Tomme Aydius is a farmhouse goat's milk cheese from the French Pyrenees named for the small town of Aydius.The cheese has a pasty pale color often with odd shapes interior air holes but rich buttery nut flavors. Though it is made from unpasteurized goat milk it does not have a strong goat's milk flavor. If I didn't know I might mistake it for a cow's milk cheese. Tomme means "cheese" in regional French and this tomme has a granular texture like parmesan of the outer edges but the interior is softer and more elastic.
A delicious cheese.
Name: Tomme Aydius or Tomme d'Aydius or Tomme de chèvre d'Aydius
Type of Milk: goat's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: France, Pyrenees
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $15.99/lb.
Pimentón, a smoked red paprika, is worked into the rind of some young Ibores cheeses, giving them a vibrant color and hint of piquantness. The raw milk that goes into Ibores comes from two hearty breeds of Spanish goats, the Retinta Extremeña and Verata, and the flavor is definitively goaty with a hint of smokiness and nutty sharpness. The texture is semi-soft, almost creamy. A very nice Spanish goat's cheese.
Name: Ibores or Queso de los Ibores
Type of Milk: goat's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in: Spain, Extremadura
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $15.99/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.
A major difference between Idiazábal and other Spanish cheeses like Manchego and Zamorano is a hint of smoke. Idiazábal (pronounce the "zá" like a strong lispy "THA") is lightly smoked over cherry wood or beech which darkens the rind but does not permeate to the heart of the cheese. The cheese is nutty with a salty grana. Delicious.
Name: Idiazábal or Queso Idiazábal or Idiazabal
Type of Milk: sheep's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Spain
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $21.99/lb.
The name "fougerus" makes me think of the French word for "werewolf" -- "loup-garou"-- as they sound nearly the same. Like a werewolf, Brie Fougerus wears a bit of a disguise. Decorating a rather ordinary looking wheel of Brie cheese are green fern fronds from which the name is derived ("fougére" is French for "fern"). When brought to the peak of ripeness or affinage, this Brie will begin to ooze at room temperature and has a smooth buttery finish with a hint of mouldy twang. Really a delcious cheese!
Name: Brie Fougerus or Fougerus or Le Fougerus or Le Fougéru
Type of Milk: cow's, unpasteurized
Type: soft
Produced in: France, Ile-de-France
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 1/11/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $16.99/lb.
In the United States most people think of blue cheese as a white cheese spotted with veins of blue mold. Some of my favorites are the orange blue cheeses like Blacksticks Blue. Smooth and spreadable as opposed to the crumbly blues, Blacksticks goes well with warm baguette or melted into warm buttered pasta. The orange cheese is creamy and the blue mold is piquant but not overpowering. A real treat.
Name: Blacksticks Blue
Type of Milk: cow's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft, blue
Produced in: England, Butlers Farmhouse Cheeses
Date Purchased: 01/11/2007
Date Eaten: 01/13/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $13.99/lb.
I love the way this English Cheshire from Neal Yard Dairy crumbles. Not like a cheddar with large curd, Appleby's Cheshire has curds like a cottage cheese--small pressed orange lumplets that cling to each other for dear life. The color is an uneven pale, natural-looking orange. The flavor is complex but not difficult to munch on. An easy snack cheese made by master cheesemakers, the Appleby family. Check out the great photos on the cheesemaker's, Neal Yard Dairy, web site.
Name: Neal Yard Dairy Appleby's Cheshire or Appleby's Cheshire
Type of Milk: cow's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: England
Date Purchased: 1/11/2007
Date Eaten: 1/16/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $18.99/lb.
The name of this raw milk cheese changes depending on the country it is being sold in. In the English-speaking world it is called Beech Tree Mountain, named for the Beechtree Mountain of central Switzerland, and is produced by the Von Mühlenen family cheese business. Beech Tree Mountain lack the lingering tang of a sharp Gruyère but has other complexities of flavor that make it an interesting guest at your next cheese party. The raw milk flavor is distinct. You also may taste the fresh hay flavors found in many cheeses from Switzerland. Spectacular flavors.
Name: Beech Tree Mountain or Bucheggberg Schlosskäse or Buckschlosskäse or Buchschlosskaese or Mont Buchegg or Monte Buchegg
Type of Milk: cow's, unpasteurized, part-skim
Type:
Produced in: Switzerland, Solothurn region, Von Mühlenen
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $19.99/lb.
Straight on the heels of my last post for a raw milk cheese from Switzerland, comes Bergblumenkäse, another Swiss cheese with a mountain in its name. Instead of a geographic hill this "Berg" is a Mountain Flower (" Bergblumenkäse" literally translates to "Mountain Flower Cheese") and different in flavor from other Swiss cheeses. You get a sense of what the cows ate as you eat this cheese. The taste reminds me of grass and hay and pleasant barnyard aromas. Wheels of Bergblumenkäse are aged in herbs and straw for six months which imparts an unusual but delightful taste. It will probably be hard to find and expensive if you can get it but for a rare treat give it a try if you can.
Name: Bergblumenkäse or Bergblume or Mountain Flower
Type of Milk: cow's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Switzerland
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $22.99/lb.
They say you always remember your first Canadian cheese. Oka from Oka, Quebec is mine. Her milky interior was soft, buttery but with a hint of resistance. Her bloomy pale flesh exterior gave no clue to the creaminess beneath the cool surface. Oh, yes, back to the cheese.
Oka is a semi-soft, rindwashed wheel with a pale yellow interior and orange mold rind exterior. If you east just the buttery center the cheese is pleasant. Combined with the top and bottom rind a delightful note of maturity and complexity is added. Good cheese, eh!
Name: Oka or Oka Classique
Type of Milk: cow's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in: Canada
Date Purchased: 12/27/2006
Date Eaten: 12/31/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $13.99/lb.
I have to confess that I sat on this cheese for a while. Not literally of course, but the time between when I purchased it and when I first tried it was well over a week and a half. What started our as a light yellow cheese with a white rind, the Tomme de Savoie became a rich gold with a dark, black and gray exterior. Cheese people call this process of aging cheese to perfect ripeness, affinage. In this case the results were good.
The first whiff after unwrapping this tomme was a bit harsh. Very much ammonia-smelling. I let it air out for 30 minutes and the odious odor had evaporated. The outer rind was still overpowering to eat in great amounts but small strips of it surrounding the healthy inner cheese were fabulous, reminding me of a master sushi chef who can dissect a posionous blowfish so that he leaves just enough of the fatal toxin to make your throat tingle.
A "tomme" in French is any small round farmhouse cheese and the full name of these cheeses usually ends with the town or region of its origin. In this case, the Haute-Savoie region of France. It is a pretty standard cheese on restaurant cheese plates and deservedly so. Well worth finding.
Name: Tomme de Savoie
Type of Milk: cow's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: France
Date Purchased: 1/11/2006
Date Eaten: 1/24/2006
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $11.99/lb.
Sometimes on trips to the cheese counter I will see a small, often handwritten, sign next to a new cheese describing interesting information about the new product. More often than not I do nothing more than read it and owing to my awful memory, hope to find the same information online or in one of my dozens of cheese books. Sometimes, as with today's cheese, Tintus, I can find no information at all.
Fortunately this cheese has a label and though written in Portuguese offers a few clues. The maroon and gold piece of paper has a picture of a spiny orb with a flowering purple blossom and words "Flor de Cardo o Queijo". Flor de Cardo translates as Cardoon or the artichoke thistle and I believe is the manufacturer of the cheese. In some Medieterranean countries thistles are used as a coagulant instead of rennet to start the milk separating into curds and whey. "Cardo" or "thistle" is listed as one of the ingredients.
Next comes the word "Tintus" which makes me think of "ink" although "tinta" is the word in Portugal. Again my search shows no town, village, region or province of Portugal called Tintus so it is unclear what the name of this cheese actually means. Next are the words "Queijo Curado de Ovelha," "aged cheese of the sheep".
The outside of the cheese is mottled with red, white, beige and gray streaks on a burlap textured rind. The red leads me to think the cheese was bathed in wine, but wine is not listed as an ingredient. Only raw sheep's milk, salt and thistle are listed. It's possible the color comes from the thistle.
The aroma is not overpowering but there is a hint of funk. The flavor starts a bit sour but finishes pleasing. Interesting for a cheese plate. I didn't eat the rind.
Name: Tintus
Type of Milk: sheep's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-soft
Produced in: Portugal, Setubal, Flor de Cardo
Date Purchased: 1/28/2007
Date Eaten: 1/30/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $13.99/lb.
From the mind of Murcia, the town and region of southeastern Spain, the same region that gave us Charo, comes a wonderfully simple aged goat's cheese called Naked Goat. Its Spanish name, queso de Murcia curado, translates simply as Aged Cheese of Murcia while the English plays on the pure, raw milk origin of this delightful cheese. I even like the label with a cartoon goat, naked of course, though I am not fooled by the playfullness and simplicity. This is a deceptively fine cheese. Aged for about 6 months Naked Goat has many of the same qualities of the great Spanish sheep's milk cheese but a solid, rich goat's milk flavor.
Name: Naked Goat or Murcia Curado DO (or DOP) or Queso de Murcia Curado
Type of Milk: goat's, unpasteurized
Type: semi-hard
Produced in: Spain, Murcia, Mitica
Date Purchased: 1/28/2007
Date Eaten: 1/30/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $15.99/lb.
The cheeses made by the Santa Marina Formaggi company on the island of Sardinia are an odd lot. I can find out almost nothing about them on the Internet. Their website used to offer images of the cheeses they produce but now consists only of a single page and the words "organic cheess" in three languages. They also make the very good cheese Granitu and the very bad Plassas. Fortunately Monte Regale is also very good.
Do not confuse Monte Regale with Toma del Monte Regale, a soft raw cow's milk cheese from the Italian Piedmont. This Monte Regale, or "regal mountain", is made from raw sheep's milk and is a very fine grating or after dinner cheese. It has a clean pecorino taste with rich lingering flavors.
Name: Monte Regale
Type of Milk: sheep's, unpasteurized
Type: hard
Produced in: Italy, Sardinia, Santa Marina Formaggi
Date Purchased: 1/28/2007
Date Eaten: 1/30/2007
Purchased Where: United States, North Carolina, Chapel Hill, A Southern Season
Price: $14.99/lb.
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