Perfection. You can’t do better than that. For Rogue Creamery’s Rogue River Blue, the perfect score rocketed it to the top of the World Cheese Awards in Bergamo, Italy, earlier this month. A grape leaf-wrapped cow’s milk wheel from Oregon, this luscious blue is now the 2019 World Champion Cheese, the first time a U.S. cheese has earned that honor. Created less than 20 years ago, it vanquished international cheeses with decades of history. Ironically, the winning wheel was not the one that Rogue president David Gremmels intended to enter.
Read morePeak Experience
I should have known the creamy cheese at twelve o’clock would be the class favorite. Never bet against a triple-cream. This one was delightful, I agree, but I found more to love in the six aged cheeses that followed—all of them mountain cheeses from Europe, all made with raw milk and animal rennet. So much tradition and expertise represented on one plate!
Read moreNext-Gen Urban Creamery
What good is cream cheese without bagels? The folks at Tomales Farmstead Creamery had the cream cheese down but couldn’t find a worthy bagel to spread it on. At least that’s the nickel explanation for their leap into the bagel business, with an ambitious new bakery-café in San Francisco. The sprawling former factory they rented was big enough for a little cheesemaking, too. So now San Franciscans have their own urban creamery whipping up cultured butter, cream cheese, quark, ricotta and ghee. Plus warm bagels. And craft beer. Hungry yet?
Read moreSticker Shock
Prepare to pay more: Stilton, Parmigiano Reggiano, Feta
The Trump Administration has just announced a 25 percent tariff on a large range of European Union products, including many cheeses. In a way, that’s good news because Trump had threatened a 100 percent tax. If you’d like to know which cheeses are affected, well, so would the importers. It’s complicated. A few well-known cheeses are indisputably on the hit list; others are questionable. But get ready for some sticker shock at the cheese counter.
Read moreBest Beer-Garden Cheese Plate
Why can’t we have Oktoberfest all year? I love those malty Oktoberfest brews, and they’re awesome with cheese. If you haven’t picked up a mixed six-pack to enjoy this month in your backyard beer garden, get on it. These once-a-year beers are always gone before the month is. And I have the perfect cheese plate to go with them.
Read moreWhat Goes with Cheese?
Cabot Clothbound Cheddar with Nectarine and Serrano Jam
When I was first introduced to fine cheese—in France, many years ago—it came with nothing. At least that’s my recollection. Just beautiful cheeses, as many as you wanted from the restaurant trolley, with more fresh-sliced baguette in the breadbasket. Now, in the Instagram age, a cheese board with cheese alone looks naked and pitiful. Where are the nuts, the honeycomb, the preserves, the pickles, the locally made artisan crackers?
Read moreButter of the Gods
If my recent lunch at Edge had concluded with the bread and butter, I would have been happy. Of course, it didn’t—several fabulous courses followed—but it was the house-made pain au levain and cultured butter I couldn’t get out of my head. I knew I couldn’t reproduce this Sonoma restaurant’s bread, which John McReynolds, Edge’s culinary director, spent many months perfecting, but I figured the butter might be within my skill set. What gave it such incredible flavor? In a word: cheese.
Read moreWhich Cheese for Good Health?
A recent Washington Post feature ranking the healthfulness of different cheeses made me more than a little cranky. I’m no nutritionist, but I knew some of the claims were not accurate. Others I suspected were not supported by science or at the least misleading. And the whole premise of the story seemed misguided. Unless you’re eating massive amounts, does it really matter to your long-term health whether you choose mozzarella or Cheddar? Life is better with both.
Read moreLate to the Party
Photo: Krys Mandilag/KM Design & Photography
My first cheese-meets-bourbon class was a big hit—at least with me. I don’t know what the attendees thought, but I was blown away by the pairings. Wine and beer are the go-to beverages chez moi, and I can pair them with cheese in my sleep. But this was my maiden voyage with bourbon and cheese. It will not be the last. So many “wow” moments.
Read moreTeleme in Trouble
Photo: Sara Remington
One of California’s iconic cheeses is in danger of extinction. Lights out. No more. Franklin’s Teleme has already been MIA since late last year, when Franklin Peluso reluctantly ceased making his supple cow’s milk classic, a former American Cheese Society Best of Show. The 74-year-old cheesemaker, whose grandfather devised the original recipe, has been trying to revive production ever since, with no luck.
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