Cheese Lovers

Cheese Lovers
I'm just crackers about cheese!
I love cheeses, but I often forget the name of a cheese I want to have more of, or I'll recognize a cheese in the store, and I can't remember if that was the one that forces the family to flee pinching their noses or not. So this is a "Cheese Blog" to record my impressions for my own use.

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

French goat cheese brie

This is an interesting cheese: mild and creamy like a Brie, but with just a hint of Feta-like tanginess from the goat cheese.  It has a light, edible natural rind.  No odor, so it's socially acceptable.  Either it got milder as it aged a week, or I got used to the flavor. 
Steve Jenkins, the cheesemonger on The Splendid Table with Lynne Rosetto Kasper, says that for pleasure per ounce, there's no better food value than a good artisan cheese. He suggests, when doing a cheese tasting, to select from different types of milk, say sheep, goat, cream, and to serve serious cheeses with serious bread. Save the crackers for the Velveeta. Matching wines, he says to match by region, making sure that neither overwhelms the other.
This would be a nice mild, but not bland, alternative in a cheese tasting with stronger partners.  Maybe paired with a gorgonzola and a smoked gouda.  Wine for this one, maybe a white, a Pinot Blanc from France.
Oooh! Oooh! How about a Pinot and cheese tasting: French goat cheese brie on Ciabatta bread with a Pinot Blanc Alsace, smoked gouda on sourdough with a light Pinot Noir, and gorgonzola on whole wheat with an Italian Pinot Grigio.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Grayson Washed Rind

The lady said "Pungent," and that was like waving a red cloth in front of a bull. In the parking lot I ate a slice in the car on an artisan ciabata roll. Full-bodied, creamy, maybe slight grassy taste, a metallic undertone. I think hardwood forest when I eat it.
I once went to a wine tasting that described the flavor of a Burgundy as "barnyard smells," the earth-hay in the early morning, slightly tangy, not quite manure smell that is the undertone of the wine.  Yep, I could taste that in the wine, and it was not a bad taste, definitely distinctive, but not bad.
Well, for this cheese, somebody needs to shovel out the barnyard stalls!  It's a little too barnyard.
After I sampled the slice, I had to go to work, and the half-opened cheese lay in the back seat for a few hours.  When I opened the car to go home, "Whew! Who cut the cheese!"  It had gone from mildly barnyard, to GI ward at the hospital.
And you ask, "Did you throw it out?" "Of course not, I'm not going to let a little smell get in the way of a good breakfast.  But I know not to share my cheese with the family. I'll finish what I bought.
It would work at a wine tasting with a strong bodied red wine, accompanied with grilled asparagus and Jamon Iberico.