Sunday, January 21, 2007

Cheese Recommendations

"3 types of pecorino and honey" (courtesy Flickr)

Apologies to anyone who thought I would be trying a new type of cheese every day. At the moment, I'm having a hard time just remembering to buy cheese on a biweekly basis. After a year of not eating the stuff, you sort of fall out of the habit of including it on your grocery list and when I have tried to buy cheese recently, I am baffled by all the choices. However, I have been soliciting recommendations from friends and family. Here are some of the suggestions for what I should try, in the hope that by making them public I will eventually get around to trying them all...
  • "I recommend tracking down some Saint-Andre, a super-intense brie, and Epoisses, a stinky cheese par excellence. And if you're back on the West coast, check out Saltspring Island Cheese Company's Blue Joliette, which—though it looks disgusting—is surprisingly palatable."
  • "One of my favourite cheese treats is to get a few types of pecorino (Pienza, Tuscany makes the best), one old and hard, one medium, and one young and soft. then you get a couple of types of runny honey, slice the pecorino and drizzle honey over them. I like to mix and match the honey and cheese. YUM."
  • Applewood Smoked Cheddar
  • Gruyere
  • "As for cheese: you could always try the stuff we called "pikkeltjes kaas" as kids (roughly translated: "cheese with spots"). It’s also referred to a Leydse kaas (sp?) and is, I think, basically a Gouda with caraway seeds or fennel or some such thing in it. Very yummy. Then there’s always the stalwart Gouda. I remember living with an aunt in Amsterdam and being sent to the "kaas boer" (cheese farmer) at the street market for "jonge belegen" -- a young Gouda. (I’m not too sure what the "belegen" referred to...) Then there’s the old, old cheese with the black wax around the wheel. That one is trés yummy, but also trés expensive (at least, here in Canada)..."
  • "Lately... I've been buying goat brie, which has opened up all sorts of possibilities for me. I also bought some fig preserve, which goes really well with the brie - highly recommended!"
Please feel free to post your recommendations in the comments section...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

ha! now i discover that the recommendation "section" is actually the comments. anyway...

ahhh the nordic SKI QUEEN! that yummy creamy caramel brown soft cheese that slices almost like butter and goes so well with gala apples. don't let the colour put you off! this cheese is like a giant cheesy kraft caramel square. really. and i love it. in fact, maybe i will go find some at thrifty's tonight

leanne

Anonymous said...

You can get personalized cheese recommendations at http://kaeseus.com.

It is sort of like HotOrNot for cheese. Just choose a couple of your preferences and then find your personalized recommendations in the box below.

Enjoy.