We’ve been hearing ad nauseum about border walls, but who knew there were butter walls? Even some folks in Wisconsin are just now realizing that their state—“America’s Dairyland”—has an impenetrable fat fence. No immigrant butters from France, Italy or Ireland, or any other foreign country, are permitted on Wisconsin grocery-store shelves. At least one Kerrygold fan has resorted to driving to a neighboring state to score some Irish butter. I’m a Kerrygold enthusiast, too, but my laid-back state (California) lets me have all I want, no questions asked.
Read moreVintage Cheese
Meg Smith Photography
My high-school French teacher introduced me to Roquefort, and I remember that she served it with butter. Purists will wince but the butter softened the bite, and it helped my teenage palate enjoy the experience. I still think it’s a good trick for a blue that’s too strong. But you won’t want butter with Bleu 1924. This luscious new French blue tastes like it has butter in it.
Read moreBack from the Brink
Redwood Hill Crottin, Redwood Hill Bucheret, Redwood Hill Terra…so long. Great to have known you. Rest in peace. Redwood Hill founder Jennifer Bice (above right) has made her last batch of California goat cheese.
After thirty years of production, Bice has decided to cease making the pioneering Sonoma County chèvres that helped launch this country’s artisan cheese movement. I’m sad but not too sad. Bice has taken some unusual steps to ensure that these cheeses will soon live again.
Read moreSo in Love
A silky flan strikes me as just the right, light finale for a candlelit dinner for two. This one, with ricotta, is the love child of crème caramel and cheesecake. I have made it often, following the recipe in A Fresh Taste of Italy by Michele Scicolone.
Read moreWe Have a Winner
She is California’s first-ever winner of the Cheesemonger Invitational, and she prevailed in a landslide. Jessica Lawrenz, you rock. The 32-year-old monger from San Diego vanquished 34 other contestants from around the country in this grueling test of talent. She cut, she wrapped, she paired, she plated. And then, she almost blew it.
Read moreTea Time
If you think chamomile is just for tea, meet Camilla. This raw-milk gem from Northern Italy, with its chamomile cloak, deftly marries innovation with tradition. Friends who tell you they don’t like goat cheese will have to reboot after tasting this one.
Read moreGouda at Last
Where’s the Gouda? Every time I see the Giacomini sisters who own Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese, I nag them. Every time I see their cheesemaker, Kuba Hemmerling, I nag him. Where is that aged Gouda you said you were making? I’ve been asking about it for years. They’ve been stonewalling me for years. And now, ladies and gentlemen, the Gouda.
Read moreSnack Attack
Shortly before I piled the cheese curds on a platter, sprinkled them with homegrown Espelette pepper and surrounded them with olives, I learned that this was a really lame idea. Cheese curds are supposed to be scarfed down like popcorn, straight from the bag. “They’re the potato chips of dairy,” says Jeanne Carpenter, a cheesemonger in Madison and authority on Wisconsin cheese. Obviously, I did it anyway, because fresh curds are rare where I live and worth some ceremony, and these were the best I had ever had.
Read moreTen Under $20
(l to r): Raschera, Taleggio, St. George, Campo de Montalban, Chevre in Blue
Yikes. Does your credit-card balance look like mine? I know January sends many of us into fits of austerity, but cutting back doesn’t have to mean cutting out. Keep eating cheese! I prowled my local cheese counters for tasty options under $20 a pound and had no trouble assembling a list of worthy contenders. These ten selections deliver amazing value and most of them are in shops year-round.
Read moreSleeper Hits of 2016
The nation’s cheese merchants know better than anyone which new cheeses are about to catch fire. They sample dozens of newcomers during the year, fall in love with some and—perhaps more important—discover which ones click with consumers.
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