American Cheese Month Feature: Inspiration

Cheese: Inspiration

Maker: Mt Mansfield Creamery

Pairings:  A washed cheese, with a stinky rind, I find this cheese notable for unexpected tart flavors, I get lemon peel and spring flowers. For this reason, I enjoyed it with a very hop forward IPA (I was in Burlington, Vermont, I bet you can guess which one!) and a piece of Twig Farm Goat Tomme, which has similar tangy notes, but is a very different cheese. Some skinless toasted almonds would be a great addition. With a drizzle of honey this would be an excellent dessert course for people who don’t like dessert.

Let’s all take a minute to be thankful for the people in our lives who are open to new experiences: the strangers at a bar who say, “I’ll have what she’s having!” after a bartender pours your Underberg into a special glass and you explain the beauties of a digestiv after a long meal; the kinds of friends that not only let you into their lives, but want to become a part of yours. I do not get lonely easily, and I know the solitary pleasure of reading a book alone; but having a friend who asks “What have you been reading?” is a very special thing. In a world that seems filled with negative commentary and sarcasm, there is a certain joy that comes from sharing something that you love. 

Underberg at Faust in Providence

This summer, I invited my friends Mallory and Gabbie along with me and my mother to the Vermont Cheesemaker’s Festival. Although I have enjoyed this event for years, I was not sure if my friends would want to wake up before dawn to make the long trek to Vermont. I wasn’t sure if they’d mind the long lines, or spending the day on their feet. Known lovers of cheese, I even worried that they might not like the earthy, stinky cheeses that have become my favorites from a state sometimes best known for approachable, mild Cheddars.

The scene at the Vermont Cheese maker's Festival

From the moment we entered the tent, these ladies were in for the full experience. They didn’t bully towards the front of the tables, absentmindedly eating samples. They held back, they listened as the makers talked, they didn’t rush me if I asked an in depth question. We all met a kindred spirit of the open-to-experiences type when we approached the table of Mt. Mansfield Creamery. If cheese maker Steve Biasini was annoyed by the heat in the tent, the strong smell of warm cheeses and wet hay, or the sometimes aggressive crowds- we couldn’t tell. He seemed almost joyful as he greeted us with energy you would expect at the beginning of the day, even though the makers had already been there for hours. He talked to us in depth, completely explaining to my friends the process of cheese making: adding cultures to fresh raw milk, letting the milk acidify, adding rennet, waiting until it’s ready to cut, stirring the curd, pouring it into molds.

Although I’ve explained this process many times, having Steve explain it while offering us his beautiful cheese gave my friends a chance to share in my excitement and curiosity, without me becoming teacherly. We were all awed by the strange chemistry and alchemy that goes into cheese making. As they asked questions I was able to step away from my preconceived expectations about the cheeses, and experience them more casually, as if for the first time. We were able to listen together, and note the different flavor profiles in Mt. Mansfields cheeses as he guided us through a tasting. We left with a hunk of Inspiration, which we liked for it’s assertive flavors of lemon peel as well as its earthy, almost floral finish. In that moment, we were all sharing something that we loved, that certain joy.

Connecticut Cheese + Connecticut Beer = Love

Cato Corner Farm has a new website and the first blog post is a series of pairings of Cato cheeses with Connecticut Beers. If you want an easy idea for a fun get together, grab a selection of local cheeses and some local beers. Arrange the cheeses from mildest to strongest inflavor and dole out sips of the different beers in shot glasses, and see which pairings you prefer. I did this on a sheet of brown paper so it would be easy to take notes as we tasted.

Read the full post here.

American Cheese Month Feature: Hooligan

Cheese: Hooligan

Maker: Cato Corner Farm, Colchester CT

Pairings: This cheese has hefty aroma and full palate coating savory flavors. I like it with a yeasty Belgian beer with citrus and coriander notes and fresh baked sour dough bread. It's also nice with a full bodied red with a spicy, dry finish. This rugged cheese can stand up to other bold flavors, so try it with a whole grain mustard and marinated peppers. It’s made with Jersey cow milk so expect piquant grassy flavors from summer batches and rich buttery texture in the winter.

The day I interviewed at Cato Corner Farm, I enjoyed a plate with Hooligan, pepper biscuits, marinated olives and peppers and garlicky hummus

On the day that I interviewed at Cato Corner Farm, they were making Hooligan. As a monger, I knew Hooligan well, as a beefy washed rind I’d offer it to lovers of French Munster cheese looking for something a little more local. I also imagined that I knew something about its make process: pump raw milk, add cultures, add rennet, cut the curd, hoop the cheese and then periodically brine it as it aged. I knew this process from books and from hearing cheese makers speak about their craft, but I had the sense I really couldn’t know how milk became cheese without making it myself.

When I got to the farm the first question someone asked me was where my cheese clothes were. Cheese clothes? What were cheese clothes? I hadn’t brought any. A lovely woman, visibly pregnant, offered me her spare outfit and as I changed in the tiny room between the walk-in cooler and cheese make room I imagined that her clothes would somehow be too small and I would have to go back home, interview over. In someone else’s T shirt and shorts, and a borrowed pair of dairy boots, I walked into the make room and my glasses steamed, and slid down my nose. In that moment I was hit with the strong yogurt-y smell of cheese making, the unrelenting heat of the room, and everything I still had to learn about cheese. After scrubbing my skin with a brush and sanitizer and putting on gloves as long as my entire arm I began to hand stir the curd, stooped over a vat taller than my waist and pulling my arms through more than 1500 pounds of curd and whey, I felt the literal weight of what I had only obliquely understood as backbreaking work.

A young Jersey peeking at me as I hike Cato's sprawling pasture

In the months since then, I have grown a deep appreciation for Hooligan. Since it ages only 60 days, I have been able to participate in each aspect of its creation from pumping the milk to washing them in the cave as they age. From the loving pats the people at the farm give to the cows as they forage, to the delicacy needed to flip them in the mold moments after they are made, to the light pressing that helps the affineurs know if the cheese is well-enough aged, Hooligan is truly a handmade cheese and emblematic of the spirit of American cheese today.

Nightfall after a long day of cheese making at Cato Corner Farm

Marinated Cheese

Growing up outside of Hartford, Connecticut, my childhood memories of food shopping with my mother are filled with the aromas of old school grocery stores. La Rosa's smelled of eggplant breaded in flour and crumbs of Romano cheese, slowly fried in olive oil. D&D had a briny smell of olives. A Greek store whose name I can no longer remember had tubs of pungent feta cheese soaked in oil, made green by oregano. Cheese and Stuff had bulk spices that I would savor individually: fennel, then basil, then thyme.

Cato Corner Vivace Bambino, Garlic, Oregano, Rosemary and Thymewait for their dunk in oil

Traditionally, marinating cheese was a way to extend it's shelf life. A ton of sea salt in water and maybe a bay leaf acted as a natural way to prevent spoilage. I marinate cheese to conjure those memories of childhood, and also because I am notorious for growing more herbs than I really know what to do with. A fistful of Rosemary in a jar of oil and Manchego cheese elevates all of it's parts. The cheese is a wonderful addition to a cheese board, or given as a gift. Add vinegar to the leftover oil for an easy salad dressing.

A simple chevre with thyme

Firm and soft cheeses can be marinated. Ricotta, chevre, Feta, Manchego and Provolone are all popular choices to marinate. If you think a cheese would taste great with a certain set of flavors, it's worth the experiment.

The ricotta on the left was quickly soaked in oil, and topped with orange zest and thyme just before serving

• Cube your cheese and place in the vessel it will marinate in.
• Add aromatics such as garlic and onions
• Add any herbs
• Add citrus peel if you like
• Submerge in a good quality oil you would serve on it's own. I prefer olive, but you can mix with a more economical oil if you like
• A marinated cheese should keep not much longer than 10 days in your fridge.

Great on it's own or on a cheese board, this home made ricotta was quickly marinated in oil, garlic and pepper before being served cold alongside a hot pasta dish

Eat Fennel For Breakfast

I have had to eat cheese virtually every single day for the past six years- not because I am insatiably hungry, or because cheese is delicious, but because as a maker and a monger of cheese I need to be able to access and evaluate the products I am producing and selling. Some days, it’s simply determining if a particular cheese is ready for the counter. Other days, it’s the American Cheese Society’s Festival of Cheese, and there are thousands of cheeses to try. How do you go from casual snacker, wantonly stabbing cubed cheddar with a toothpick, to seasoned taster, squishing cheese in your fingers and deeply inhaling before each bite, selectively choosing the best and ripest cheeses?

Just some of the Cheeses at the 2014 American Cheese Society's Festival of Cheese

Professional tasting involves a lot of research and training, but if I could recommend one place to begin: eat fennel for breakfast.

If you are going to an all-day cheese festival, or you plan to be tasting a lineup of cheeses, no other bit of preparation will serve you better. If you don’t love fennel you can certainly opt for a kale smoothie or some other high fiber, high nutrient meal, but for me, you really cannot beat the perfection of a fennel salad. Although calorie-dense, cheese on its own will not really make you feel full. Starting with fennel prevents you from feeling too-hungry while tasting. It also stimulates digestion which is very helpful, indeed.

While attending the American Cheese Society Conference in Providence this year, I repeatedly stopped by Figidini for the fennel salad they had on their menu.

Inspired by Figidini, Fennel Salad for a day of cheese tasting:

Slice a fennel bulb on a mandolin (use the finger guard!) or sliced as thinly as possible with a very sharp knife, toss with juice from ¼ lemon and a teaspoon of olive oil. Dressed, this can keep in your fridge for a few days- the fennel will soften as it marinates.

Serve with some sliced citrus, your favorite olives and a few springs of mint.

On Choosing a Blue Cheese

"I have this memory of a certain pub in England, where I had a crusty roll and a bite of Stilton and a bit of bitter beer. It was around the time I met my wife, so Stilton will always be the best blue cheese for me! But, you're right, Bayley Hazen is nice, too." 

A gentleman clutched a piece of Stilton in one hand, and Bayley Hazen Blue in the other. He stood there for a while, not moving, before I asked him if he needed any help selecting a blue cheese. He gave me his explanation for choosing the Stilton, and I told him that it was one of the most beautiful things I had ever heard anyone said about food, or really, anything at all.

Cheese that Looks Like a Brain

The biochemistry of cheese is a giant wormhole that can keep you occupied, quite possibly, forever. You can think about cheese as a rubbery, fatty, melt-y thing- and all of that is fascinating. But when you think about milk as a nutrient and fat dense substance created by the body of a mothering mammal for it's young, and cheese as that vulnerable substance left out to rot as microbes- introduced and in the environment- colonize it until it gets so far gone, it's good again... well, that's really fascinating. Right? 

For your consideration: Cheese That Looks Like a Brain

Vermont Creamery's Bonne Bouche. I take a local raw honey and put mulling spices in the jar: cinnamon stick, clove, cardamom and a vanilla bean and use it for toast and tea. It's warm, fragrant spice is a wonderful match for the earthy flavors of this cheese. I served this with a hearty seed bread.

Perhaps you have encountered such a thing? This style is characteristic of cheeses from the Loire Valley in France, but the Vermont Creamery (formerly the Vermont Butter and Cheese Company) started making a line of these cheeses in Vermont and now, there a relatively common find. The microbe responsible for this characteristic brain-y rind is Geotrichum candidum, a fungus. In the case of the cheeses we eat today, it is most likely applied to a puck of set cheese after the milk has been coagulated and the whey has been drained. Any microbe added in cheesemaking after the first lactic fermentation is called a "secondary culture" and includes these fungi, and other moldmicrobes that may be introduced (as when strains of mold are added to a cheese to create a blue variety). When these microbes are applied to a already shaped cheese, they might be called "smear ripened", "mold ripened", "bloomies" or "whites". I've often heard these brain-y cheeses called "georind" or "geos".

In modern cheesemaking these isolated strains of fungus are added in a sterile, controlled environment, but it is very interesting to think about the history of cheesemaking and all of the wild yeasts and molds that may have alighted upon a young cheese, and the bravery that must have gone into cheese-making in the days before modern science. The histories of cheese making in different areas, the "Cheese Culture", if you will ignore the punning, has so much to do with the local microclimate of these distinct regions. Early cheesemakers would wash, wrap, and brine their newly formed cheeses to encourage or inhibit the growth of these organisms they knew virtually nothing about. Even today, the most technologically advanced cheese makers will discover new varieties flourishing on their rinds without fully understanding why. If you bought Jasper Hill's Harbison this year it might have had a sticker on it explaining the furry blue-green mold that dotted it's wooden belt, and might have been responsible for this year's distinct flavor.

When Geothrichum candidum is applied to the exterior of a young goat cheese it begins to grow, and releases enzymes. As milk transforms to cheese, the proteins in the milk are broken down, "proteolysis" as are the fats, "lipolysis". When you introduce a mold and the enzymes it produces, these processes are affected greatly. The pH changes, the rate of break down changes. Someone with a degree in biochemistry could explain this better, but what you need to know- as an eater of cheese- is the affect they have on taste, and looks, probably

• the surface of the cheese has a brainy texture which might cause some pockets of moisture
• the area just below the rind has ripened the most and creates a gooey, gluey layer
• depending on several factors, this goo is somewhere between "brie-y like" and a funky smelling rivulet
• because of this uneven ripening these cheeses need to be cared for carefully- in cheesemaking, by your monger, and in your home (be gentle, keep it in your butter drawer, share with your very best friends.)

Tasting notes and things to consider while tasting

• take one adventuresome bite with a bit of rind and core and notice any impression. Chew the way you normally chew, eat it as if it is something familiar
• then take another series of tiny bites, of each part of the cheese: rind, goo, and core
• keep these bite on your tounge for a moment so it warms, and you have time to develop a full impression. With your mouth closed, breath up into your nose- basically, smell what is in your mouth and see if that changes your impression
• Tasting the rind: note the glue-y tacky texture. Note any earthy, mushroom flavors. Is the bumpiness of the cheese noticeable?
• Tasting the goo: describe the texture. Is it milk-y? glue-y? brie-like? If a cheese smells and tastes strongly of ammonia it is overripe, but frequent tasters-of-cheese often come to appreciate a funkiness you will often find in this style of cheese. Do you ever cut a bunch of basil and notice a strong, pungent aroma? Do you notice something like that now?
• Tasting the core: this will often have a chalky texture and taste like young goat cheese aka chevre. Can you find new flavors to describe what you know as "goat cheese-y" keeping this cheese in your mouth think about the following flavors and aromas- do you find any?
  • grass (the smell of fresh mown grass, a field in springtime...)
  • hay
  • herbs (thyme, sage, parsley)
  • lemon (juice, zest)
  • musky mushroomy aromas
  • yogurt
  • honey (honeycomb)