Cheesy Lover
19 November 2009
Tomme de Savoie
Raw-milk cow cheese from France, from Le Marché du Quartier
This wedge of cheese is grubby on the outside; gray and brown, pitted and wrinkled. Inside it’s a soft moist translucent creamy paste dotted with little holes. The inside tastes tastes tangy and bright and grassy and citrussy, the rind composty and dusty and mushroomy. It’s a happy contrast of taste and texture.
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23 November 2009
Cone du Port Aubry
Raw French goats cheese, from Mons
Cone du Port Aubry is, as the name implies, conical. Internet anecdote says that the cheesemaker nicked his wife’s bra and used it as a cheese mould. If this is true, then the cheesemaker’s wife has alarmingly large and pointy breasts. My slice of cheese is a pale off-white on the inside, turning squishy towards the rind. The rind’s darker and partially covered in a pale grey bloom.
It’s surprisingly dense inside – the texture’s like plasticine – but it melts in the mouth. Initially the cheese tastes astringently herbal, and lemony-goaty. This fades into a contrasting creaminess with hints of coffee and chocolate and hazelnut. Towards the rind a soft mushroom taste appears, alongside some surprising fruity moments – tangerine, pineapple – and some prickly pepperyness. There’s very little bitterness in the rind; it’s soft and sweet and bright. more »
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27 November 2009
Flower Marie
Soft, white-rinded, raw-milk sheep cheese, from Sussex, bought from Neal’s Yard Dairy
Flower Marie comes in little brick-like squares. The rind is white with gentle pink tinge, and adorably soft and velvety-furred and strokeable – like a baby animal. The cheese inside’s pale and creamy, a touch crumbly in the centre, and sticky – almost liquid – directly under the rind.
It tastes bright and light and salty and fruity, and very rich and creamy. There’s just a hint of a herbal, floral flavour, and soft and gentle caramel and nutty flavours. Towards the rind there are hints of mushroom. Overall, it’s sweet and rich and mellow, gentle, varied and subtle. more »
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1 December 2009
It’s almost exactly six months since I posted the first of these cheesy writeups, and cheese # 50 is coming up later this week. Either of these things would be a good excuse for a celebration. Both together most definitely are! Clearly, the way to celebrate having eaten FIFTY cheeses is to eat some more cheese, no? I’ve yet to figure out the minor details of this. (Or, actually, anything beyond NYOM NYOM eat more cheese.) Does anyone have any clever suggestions?
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3 December 2009
Colleagues L and D bravely join me for this cheesy lunch.
Brillat Savarin
French unpasturised soft cow’s milk cheese, bought from Une Normande à Londres
We have a quarter of a squat round wheel of this cheese. It’s smooth and fluffy white on the outside, and softly creamy-white on the inside. In the mouth it’s silky-smooth, incredibly rich, intensely creamy. The melting texture reminds me of posh chocolate truffles. Tastes are subtle, a gentle mushroomishness, a hint of buttermilk, and just the tiniest whiff of the fermented almost-rancid taste of really nice butter. This is a seductive old crooner of a cheese, and incredibly more-ish. more »
marna in FT /Pumpkin Publog • 3 Comments
11 December 2009
Rubloz
Washed rind cheese, from Switzerland, bought from Kaseswiss.
My wedge of rubloz is pretty pungent, soft and squishy.The inner paste’s a pale creamy grey colour, and it’s coated in a darker biscuit-coloured rind. The rind is thick and feels crumbly. The cheese has a good strong whomph of washed-rind sockishness. Aside from that, it’s sweet and toffee-ish, mellow and creamy, a slight bit yeasty, but with a hint of bitterness underneath. There’s a bright fruity strawberry acidity that takes me by surprise, and really brightens up the cheese. Cheese-eating companion declares that this cheese looks like pie and smells like a wet dog. (He likes both pie and dogs very much.)
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15 December 2009
Wigmore
Soft unpasturised sheeps cheese, made in Berkshire and bought from Neal’s Yard Dairy.
Our slice of this cheese has a thick wrinkled white and yellow rind. Inside, the paste is slippery and silky, melting onto the paper in an oozy sticky mass. It’s salty! There are hints of bacon to this – smokey and savoury. It’s milky and fudgy, and there’s a hint of hay about the rind. I love this cheese; it’s rich and salty and soft and feels wonderfully indulgent.
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17 December 2009
Christmas cheese next week! Stilton’s the canonical choice, I believe, but what are your Christmas cheesy traditions?
Finn
Soft raw-milk cow’s cheese, made in Herefordshire and bought from Neals Yard Dairy
This is a squat little barrel of cheese, and I have half of one for my lunch. It’s got a white bloomy rind, and a pretty soft pale yellow paste; darker towards the edges. Towards the middle there’s a slightly chalky, crumbly texture.
The rind’s bitter, tasting of nettles; dark green and undergrowthy. Inside, it tastes sour and tart and salty, very creamy and with a smidge of rancid butter, There’s a green floral aftertaste – this might be the influence of the nettley rind – and just the merest hint of truffley mushroom. This cheese is delicious now, and I reckon it would be rather differently delicious in a week or two; softer and even creamier, with those hints of mushroom coming to the foreground, and a mellower caramel taste. This little cheese doesn’t get the chance to become a melting puddle of mushroom, though; it gets gobbled up in one go!
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22 December 2009
Blue raw cow’s milk cheese, made high up on a French alp, and bought from Mons.
Lunch is a thin wedge of this odd-looking cheese. The outer third the of the cheese is blue, and further towards the center it’s a soft pale crumbly primrose yellow. There’s not much veining in the blue, as such – it’s dense and widespread enough that the cheese itself appears to be a marbled, mottled blue colour. This cheese isn’t pierced with a blue mould – instead the blue mould is left to work its way in naturally.
I start to eat this from the centre outwards. The cheese is soft and moist, with a crumbly, granular texture. It’s slightly tart and acidic, and nutty and fudgey, especially towards the rind. It tastes of bubblegum and flowers, and also wonderfully buttery. As I nibble along my slice, from centre to edge, the cheese suddenly starts to taste blue. It’s very mellow. All the sweet, tart, floral flavours of the inside are still pinging about, but with an overlay of gently spicy blue. The rind, when I reach the outside, is crumby and sandy, and not all that interesting to eat. The rest of the cheese is, though! It’s subtle and delicious, and unusual – like no other blue cheese I’ve ever tried.
marna in FT /Pumpkin Publog • 2 Comments
23 December 2009
This raw-milk, blue cows cheese is made in Nottinghamshire. I bought some from Rennet and Press, and it’s also available from Neal’s Yard Dairy.
Stichelton’s a stilton-like cheese, but made with unpasturised milk. It’s a moist cheese, pale yellow, with a deep green-blue veining that’s denser towards the centre of the cheese.
It’s gloriously rich and buttery, smooth and soft, melting in my mouth. There’s a bright rich spicy, blue taste, and some underlying caramel sweetness, and a fruityness that’s not too dense and not too tart – pears and apples, I think. Lots of toasty, smooth hazelnut flavours, and a decent, but not overwhelming, amount of salt round it out. The rind’s delicious, too – the fruit and caramel notes come to the fore out at the edges where the veining’s less intense.
Corruptible Vegan is definitely corrupted by this cheese. She hacks lumps off and eats it straight from the knife.
Cheesy woofer: When Finn smells me taking this out of my bag he spontaneously sits down in anticipation, wagging his tail with hungry glee. How can I not let him sample it? He declares it delicious, and eats even the bluest bits from the centre.
Conclusion: Delicious, and proper Christmassy, this cheese. We have another wedge of this waiting for Christmas evening and a glass or two of port.
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