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Janet Fletcher

180 Stonecrest Dr
Napa, CA, 94558
(707) 265-0404
{ Janet Fletcher / Food Writer }

{ Janet Fletcher / Food Writer }

Janet Fletcher

  • Home
  • About
    • About Janet
    • Media
    • Client List
    • Contact
  • Planet Cheese
    • Planet Cheese Blog
    • Planet Cheese Signup
    • Cheese Library
  • Store
    • All Items
    • World Cheese Tour
    • Books
  • Classes
    • World Cheese Tour Classes
    • Other Classes & Events
    • Custom Class/Event Request
    • Cheese O'Clock Video Archive
  • Recipes
    • Spring
    • Summer
    • Autumn
    • Winter
    • Comfort

Cheesy Pop Quiz

June 3, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com
Cottage Cheese & Ricotta

It felt like a pop quiz that I should ace. “What’s the difference between cottage cheese and ricotta?” a reader asked recently. Anyone can tell them apart in a tasting (right?), but what makes them different is harder to say. The method for cottage cheese is largely, but not entirely, standardized; big producers often take shortcuts. Creameries make ricotta in multiple ways, too. Let’s take a deeper dive into these two fresh cheeses so you know whether they’re interchangeable in recipes and what you can expect when you open that tub.

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In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags cottage cheese, ricotta, Bellwether Farms
15 Comments

Next-Level Chopped Salad

May 13, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com

I did not know that chopped salad had a celebrity pedigree, but AI just informed me. I went searching for some history on the dish, which I associate with red-sauce restaurants, and learned that it likely originated in Beverly Hills in the 1950s. Chopped salads with chickpeas, salame and mozzarella were a favorite with tony Angelenos, fancied by starlets like Natalie Wood and ladies-who-lunch like Nancy Reagan. Seven decades later, they’re still popular. They’re colorful, crunchy and amenable to improv. Include what you like; omit what you don’t.

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In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags Rogue Creamery, Smokey Blue, chopped salad, blue cheese, Oregon cheese
5 Comments

Next-Level Chopped Salad

May 13, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com

I did not know that chopped salad had a celebrity pedigree, but AI just informed me. I went searching for some history on the dish, which I associate with red-sauce restaurants, and learned that it likely originated in Beverly Hills in the 1950s. Chopped salads with chickpeas, salame and mozzarella were a favorite with tony Angelenos, fancied by starlets like Natalie Wood and ladies-who-lunch like Nancy Reagan. Seven decades later, they’re still popular. They’re colorful, crunchy and amenable to improv. Include what you like; omit what you don’t.

Read more
In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags Rogue Creamery, Smokey Blue, chopped salad, blue cheese, Oregon cheese
Comment

Raising the Bar on Buttery

March 25, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com
Cut wheel of Briar Rose Creamery Butterbloom

I was shopping for cheeses recently for a sparkling wine tasting and hoping to find a few selections my guests wouldn’t know. This bloomy-rind beauty caught my eye because even I didn’t know it. A gentle probe of the exterior told me it was ripe. But was it tasty?

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In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags Briar Rose Creamery, Oregon cheese, Butterbloom, Guernsey cows
8 Comments

Canadian Cheddar Welcome Here

March 18, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com
Avonlea Cheddar from COWS Creamery in Canada

If you want to show Canada some love right now, seek out this award-winning Canadian Cheddar. I was surprised to find it at a local shop recently; we get so few cheeses of any type from our northern neighbor.

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In From: Canada, Milk: Cow Tags Cheddar, clothbound Cheddar, Canadian Cheddar, Canadian cheese, Prince Edward Island, COW Creamery
10 Comments

So Long to Another American Cheese

January 20, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com

America wouldn’t have a dairy industry without immigrants. Italians, Dutch, Germans, French, Mexicans, Swiss…they came here with their recipes and expertise, started dairy farms and made the cheeses they knew. Next week, one of these immigrant families—cheesemakers for five generations—is calling it quits, and I’m not the only one grieving.

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In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags Matos Cheese, St. George cheese, Sonoma County cheese
22 Comments

New Year, New Artisan Cheese

January 13, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com

Getting the year off to a promising start, this new cheese makes me hopeful that America’s small dairy farms can find a way forward. We are losing these enterprises at an alarming rate—down 95 percent since the 1970s. Is that trend line irreversible, or are there viable models for young people who want to milk cows and make cheese?

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In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags Stony Pond Farm, Vermont cheese, Vermont travel, Swallow Tail Tomme, raw milk cheese, rotational grazing
5 Comments

Cottage Cheese is Having a Moment

January 6, 2025 janet@janetfletcher.com

Because my mom was on a diet her entire life, I grew up with cottage cheese. I didn’t dislike it, but I definitely associated it with deprivation. That was then. Today, cottage cheese is a TikTok phenom, with hundreds of millions of views and counting.

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In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags cottage cheese, Good Culture, toast toppings, avocado toast
28 Comments

New Blue for the Holidaze

November 12, 2024 janet@janetfletcher.com

A debut from Jasper Hill Farm is always newsworthy on Planet Cheese, but this recently launched blue could be a supernova. The Whole Foods monger who alerted me to it called it “lovely to say the least” and cradled the package in her arms like a baby. Even my husband enjoyed it, which, when it comes to blue cheese, is not a bet I ever make. It’s fruity, winey and moist, with an offbeat shape and novel packaging. Everything about this Vermont newcomer screams “holiday cheese boards.”

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In From: U.S., Milk: Cow Tags Withersbrook Blue, raw milk cheese, Eden ice cider, Jasper Hill Farm, blue cheese, American blue cheese, raw milk blue cheese, Vermont cheese
8 Comments

Swiss With a Twist

October 21, 2024 janet@janetfletcher.com

I don’t quite get it, but not everyone loves the same cheeses I do. Those beefy, concentrated alpine cheeses I adore can strike some folks as over the top. “Too much flavor” is one critique I’ve heard but could never imagine saying myself. If you tend to like cheeses that show a bit more restraint, this Swiss beauty may be for you. It’s a little younger than many comparable mountain cheeses, and while I don’t find it remotely lacking in aroma or flavor, it’s not as in-your-face as some.

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In From: Switzerland, Milk: Cow Tags Swiss cheese, raw milk cheese, Jùscht, alpine cheese, Gourmino
8 Comments
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Welcome to my world: a fragrant, fascinating universe devoted to great cheese. In this and future Planet Cheese posts, you’ll find profiles of the world’s best cheeses plus insights into everything cheese: shops, recipes, interviews, pairing discoveries, classes, videos, travel. If you haven’t already done so, sign up here - it’s complimentary - and join me in learning something new about cheese every week.


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     Photographs: Douglas Fletcher, Ed Anderson, Megan Clouse, Faith Echtermeyer, Eva Kolenko,
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