Mothais

Dusty. I said I'd get all adjectival, and there it is. This is a dusty cheese. Semisoft, with a pleasant washed rind, and a sharp, dusty taste. This is not real dust, like when you lick an old pillow (I'm not the only person who's accidentally done this, am I? C'mon, make me feel better: go lick a dusty pillow now. Done? Thanks.), but cheese-taste-dusty. It can't be explained. Dusty, plus the expected sharp tang of a good, unpasteurized French cheese. I believe this is cow's milk. I believe it is from Provence, but I may be wrong. This is hard to find, as I had to get it at the Formaggio Kitchen in Cambridge, not my usual spot--the Wine & Cheese Cask in Somerville.

I passed up an opportunity to try out a couple of cheeses from Corsica yesterday. Sorry.

Cabecou

*Mothais coming soon!*

Cabecou

WHOA! Who'd've thought an innocent little soft (no rind) goat cheese could pack such a...a...bang! zest! Zoom!

First of all, it's wrapped in a chesnut leaf, and it's about 1 1/2 inch in diameter, so...cute! Next, it's dusted with cracked peppercorn and some other unidentifiable herbs. but then you bite into it, and your tongue and related sensory organs are greeted with something approaching, if you believe it, a fruity white wine. Yes, fruity. I realize that this diary should be very adjective-laden, so here's this entry's adjective: FRUITY.

Tits!

Teton de Santa Ana

It looks like a tit. Teton means tit. Does it taste like tits? I can't be sure, but it certainly tastes like a damn fine goat cheese. Salty, but not overpowering. I suspect pasteurization, if only because it tastes far milder than the Mothais (see next entry), which is definitely au lait cru.

The tit is slightly aged--dry rind, but no serious mold, and the inside is semihardened--and I think dusted with herbs. I get a little bite of oregano or some such thing every few nibbles. Whoo!

Nice tits, Saint Anne.

The Book of Cheese

A Financial Quandry

I checked out a book about cheese from the library. A very useful book--the one I've been referring to in these pages, in fact. Well, that damned book was due back to the library two days ago, and I logged on to the library's web page to view my account, and next to this book it said "NOT RENEWABLE." Crap! And here I was, planning to take this marvelous volume with me to Seattle for a week. Now: public library fines here are pretty steep--I think something like $0.50 a day. And that book is pretty useful; I was going to rope my dad into my cheese exploration project, but I needed the book, so I could point theatrically at a page and say something like, "Look, Dad, we MUST to get this boursin!!" and he would say, "But of course, ma cherie!", and off we would rush in our silver Volvo sedan to the nearest fromagerie, book still in hand so we could compare the actual product with the closeup photos, puzzling over how aged the pate looks, or how off-color the rind, preferably doing all of the above loudly in thick French accents.

Well, I'm still going to do all that. The question is, should I hang on to the library book and accumulate fines, or should I return it posthaste and buy a copy? Which is more cost-effective? Or better yet, shall make Daddy Dearest buy it? Yes, that, friends, is the Answer.

The reblochon and morbier went over quite well at my book group last night.

One of these days I'm going to review

Soya Kaas or some other vegan "cheese," but not today.

Reblochon

The Reblochon is disappointingly brie-like. I say this because when I started out on this little cheese adventure, I promised myself: "Only obscurish French cheeses! No cheddar, swiss, brie, feta, or anything else you can get at Shaw's. I'm gonna be a snob, big-time, when I'm through with this, goddammit!" So you see, when I come across a creamy, soft cheese with a light flavor and a soft rind, and no "bite" to speak of, I get disappointed. Yeah, this is a raw milk cheese, but how far can that little gimmick go? I was elated when I first discovered that non-pasteurization was the road to success, but now the charm is worn out. I hope this reblochon isn't a foreshadowing of my disenchantment to come. Suppose I wake up tomorrow and say, "To hell with cheese! I'm going non-dairy because my Ashkenazic lactose intolerant genes are shouting at me to stop, and all those damned coagulated, aged milk solids are starting to taste the same."? Well, shucks, I guess then I'll just move on to another hobby, like reading and reviewing back issues of Granta. But y'all wouldn't like that, would y'all?

Good thing I'm hosting my book group tomorrow night. I think some of them like brie.

Tomme de Savoie

Tomme de Savoie

Raw cow's milk, semihard, from the Rhone-Alpes region. This cheese sports a very thick, crusty, rind of greyish mold. I tried eating a little of the rind, and while the mold taste wasn't overwhelming, I found its texture unappealing. I'm still a little squeamish about moldy cheeses, please forgive me.

The cheese itself is nicely salty--that and its firmness actually reminds me a lot of cheddar. This tomme, like most of its ilk, has little holes in it, which make the cheese less dense.

I don't really know what to do with salty cheeses except put them in salads, but somehow I was inspired to drop a few cubes of the tomme into my Progresso french onion soup, in lieu, I suppose, of the traditionally called-for french bread and gruyere. Well, that turned out to be a bad idea, because, as I've said, this is a salty cheese, and french onion soup from a can is already salty. Failure! But I saved most of the tomme and enjoyed it as it should be enjoyed--completely on its own.

Rating: Assez bien.

Morbier

This is a semisoft, raw (as opposed to pasteurized) cow's milk cheese. It comes, according to my cheese book*, from the Franche-Comte region in Eastern France. Let's start with the rind.

The rind is a lovely pale terra-cotta color, and is medium-hard and thin. It has that peculiar tang that white-mold, raw milk, French cheeses all seem to have, at least in my limited experience. It reminds you that you aren't gnawing on some plasticky, processed supermarket purchase. On to the pate.

The pate (the stuff in the middle) is soft, tangy but mild, and melts beautifully. Tomorrow morning, I'm going to have a croque-monsieur with this stuff. In the middle of the pate is a thin line of vegetable ash, which at first glance looks like blue mold. It seems to add a little bite to it, but that may be my imagination. It definitely adds color to the cheese's whole presentation; you look at it and immediately know, with a certain pride, "I am about to eat a fine French cheese."

My only complaint with this cheese is its name. I haven't bothered to look it up (stay tuned, I'll probably get around to it), but any word that starts with "morb-", you look at it, and expect it to end with "-id", "-idity", or "-ibound". Not something I wish to evoke in my cheese exploration project here.

To end on a positive note, let me sum up: Bien! I haven't devised a rating system, so you'll have to settle for an unweighted French adjective for now.

*Please note that I am not endorsing the services of Amazon.com. That link is just for your reference, and I encourage you to try smaller, independent online retailers, such as alibris.com. It's just that Amazon's pages are pretty stable, and I am, certainly, endorsing this particular book.