Goats are Great

If A. and I ever start a farm on the outskirts of Ottawa (as conceptualized while driving around Nova Scotia a few weeks ago), I told her that I want to have goats, in part because I would like to learn to make goat cheese. Over the course of this year, I have found it to be reliably good as you may have gathered by reading the many posts I've made about the stuff (particularly during my summer salad days).

The latest one to cross my plate comes from the good folks at Alexis de Portneuf: Paillot de chevre is a soft surface-ripened cheese whose name comes from the straw that's used traditionally in the transport of goat cheese.

I've tried two of this fromagerie's products in the summer—Do Re Mi, their halloumi, and Capriny, one of their chevres—but didn't write about them, though both were good. However, I am frequently seduced by Alexis de Portneuf's labels at the grocery store: have a peek at the website and see how lovely they are (and award-winning it turns out).

Anyway, I bought the mini-round of Paillot for $5.77 at Whole Foods after trying a most delicious cheese that was out of my price range. Even though the cheaper cheese was not the same, it still hit a couple of the same notes:

• Creamy
  
• Strong-flavoured
• Somewhat stinky
  

Much of the flavour of this cheese is in the rind (remember it's "surface-ripened") and that flavour totally recalls blue cheese (which is why B. didn't really like it when I gave him some to try) but slightly more sour (the website uses the word "acidulous"). In any case, it pairs nicely with rye crackers (followed maybe by a bit of jam or fruit paste) and the cheesemakers recommend eating it with Saumur red wine ("Saumur Champigny are among the best red wines in the Loire Valley").

Blue Cheese: NOT the final frontier!

My Dad LOVES blue cheese. I never really cared for the flavour and once it really turned my stomach. But this summer, at M&E's baby shower, there were appetizer-sized bits of bread with mushrooms and melted blue cheese, of which I ate several and they were DELICIOUS. But, still, I put off buying any "bleu" for myself.

Until last week. Last week, I was at my favourite within-walking-distance-of-work organic grocery store and, as usual, they had free food samples by the cash (why do you think it's my favourite?). This time it was blue cheese. "From Quebec." The cashier couldn't tell me anything else (though there was a hand-written sign taped to the fridge in the back with some more info written on it but I forgot to take note of it). The small amount I tried while paying for organic apples left a lovely taste in my mouth and kept me thinking about it for the rest of the afternoon. So after work I went back and bought more. And I made an omelette for dinner. What flavour! I've since bought more, which is the block in the photo above. We had a mini in-office party when B brought in two cheeses (see below) and walnut bread, and I went out and picked up fruit and some more of the blue (which B doesn't like but C LOVED).

The other two cheeses we had were:


















Both were yummy but I preferred the Mamirolle (cow's milk, from Quebec if I remember correctly) because it had the stronger taste but the Corsu Vecchiu (sheep's milk, from Corsica) was also very nice.

The more cheeses I try in this project, the more I seem to crave more pronounced flavours... Any suggestions for what I should try next? Post 'em in the comments.

Always use the best ingredients

Reading the biography of Alice Waters reminded me that the best food starts with the best ingredients, which often means expensive. Not always, but with cheese it's usually the case. For example, pesto made with grocery-store pre-grated parmesan will never be as good (in my opinion) as pesto made with high-quality, imported-from-Italy, bought-from-a-cheesemonger Parmesan Reggiano, even if the former is dirt-cheap and the latter costs a bomb.
Having won a bit of money at a bike race yesterday, I decided to treat myself to some nice cheese to put in the pesto I was planning to make with the $0.99 fresh basil from Koreatown and pinenuts left over from our Montreal Thanksgiving meal. Even though the tiny 50-gram block I got cost more than all of the other ingredients combined, and I had to use it all up, it was worth it: the resulting pesto is fantastic.

Mimolette!

A couple posts back, I mentioned that a Toronto food critic's "desert island cheese" was mimolette and when my dad was in town I had the chance to try it. We were walking up Yonge St. to meet someone he used to work with and had some time to kill so I suggested we pop into All the Best, which typically has free samples on weekends. We were not disappointed: there was a guy handing out pasta and sauce just inside the door, slices of pickled beets a few steps away, and self-serve goat cheese and crackers towards the back of the store. We tried everything and it was all delicious but what caught my dad's eye was the mimolette for sale behind the cheese counter glass. James Chatto was right, the uncut cheese looks like a cross between a cannonball and a canteloupe. I didn't try any in the store but my dad did and was convinced by the taste to buy some. I'm glad he did and that he was willing to share.

I first tried the mimolette on its own and it was good: bright orange and salty, it was like a cross between aged cheddar and hard parmesan. In omelettes, for which I'm been won over to using hard cheeses, it was delicious. Not sure of its worthiness as a cheese with which to be marooned but worth a taste nonetheless.

A cheese-free recipe

SIMPLE LEEK SOUP

2-3 tbsp unsalted butter

3 leeks (preferably organic)

2 potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced

water

some cream if desired

salt

1. Wash leeks well and slice/chop finely (green and white parts).
2. In a large soup pot, heat butter on low heat until it melts.
3. Add sliced leeks and toss with wooden spoon to coat with butter, then sprinkle with some salt.
4. Cover pot with lid, turn up heat to medium and let the leeks soften, stirring periodically and turning down heat and/or adding oil/butter if leeks are burning/sticking.
5. Once leeks seem soft enough, add potato slices to pot, then enough water to cover vegetables and then some.
6. Turn temperature up to medium-high and simmer covered (with lid slightly ajar) until potatoes are very soft.
7. Let soup cool, then puree in batches in blender, adding more water (and up to 1/4 cup of cream) if necessary to achieve desired consistency.
8. Return soup to pot and season with salt to taste (at least a couple teaspoons).

Makes about four litres of lovely pale-green soup, which stores well in fridge for 1-2 weeks or frozen for several months.

Notes: I used 3 tbsp of butter and a couple tbsp of cream but soup would obviously be healthier with olive oil and milk (or just water).

Credit: after a recipe in S.O.U.P.S.: Seattle's Own Undeniably Perfect Soups by Michael Congdon

I give thanks for cheese

While shopping for Thanksgiving dinner supplies at Atwater Market in Montreal, M. and I found free samples of cheeses and fell in love with "Époisses," a pungent unpasteurized cow's milk cheese. Even though it was $7.50 for what seemed like a tiny piece (half of a 10cm round), we couldn't not buy it - it had such lovely mouth feel and was by far the tastiest kind we tried.

I knew I'd heard the name Epoisses before and when I checked the cheese blog archives it turned out that D. had recommended it way back in January - "Epoisses, a stinky cheese par excellence," he e-mailed in response to my request for cheese suggestions.

Thanks to Wikipedia, I learned that:

• it's made (not surprisingly) in the village of Époisses, which is located between Dijon and Auxerre, in France.
  
• it's washed in Marc de Bourgogne, the local pomace brandy, which is why it has a distinctive soft red-orange colour
  
• it's best served with a good red Burgundy wine (or even Sauternes).

Also, Napoleon was a particular fan of the cheese, and the "famous epicure" Brillat-Savarin himself classed it as the "king of all cheeses."

(As an appetizer for our Thanksgiving meal, we also ate Camembert, caramelized onions, and sliced pears wrapped in puff pastry and baked - DELICIOUS.)


BONUS LINKS!

Read about a rockstar turned cheesemaker:
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/264784

Grilled cheese goes gourmet in Toronto:
http://www.tasteto.com/2007/10/07/grilled-cheese-goes-gourmet/#more-2044
(spoiler: Beemster Vlaskaas turns out to be the best)

100-mile Cheese

On the website of the Toronto-based cheese educators Cheese Culture, I found an entire newsletter article devoted to Toronto's 100-mile cheeses. You can download the newsletter and read it yourself, but here are some interesting nuggets of information I learned from it about cheddar and the names of a number of local cheesemakers (a number of which are new to me!):

LOCAL CHEDDAR

• "In 1903 there were 3000 cheddar makers throughout Quebec and Ontario... Most of these producers closed or were bought out as cow milk cheese operations mega-sized during ensuing years."
  
• "The unfortunate thing about cow dairying is that with the exception of on-farm processors (none currently making cheddar in Ontario), milk comes from pooled sources, and in some cases has traveled quite a distance to arrive at the cheese maker. This mixed and unidentifiable provenance frustrates localists, cheese makers, environmentalists, and raw-milk cheese advocates alike."
• Toronto's 100-mile cheddar: Pine River Cheese (Kincardine)
• Under 150 miles: Black River Cheese Company (Prince Edward County), Jensen Cheese (Simcoe), and Maple Dale (Plainfield)
  

Other 100-mile cheesemakers mentioned in the article:

• Paron Cheese (Hannon) for Montasio (and other Italian-style cheese)
  
• International Cheese (Toronto) for pizza cheeses
• Portuguese Canadian Cheese [PDF] (Etobicoke) for cow and goat's milk cheeses named after individual Azores islands
• Monforte Dairy (Millbank) and Ewenity Dairy Co-op (Conn) for sheep's milk cheeses
• C’est Bon Cheese (St. Mary’s) and Woolwich Dairy (Orangeville) for goat's milk cheeses

More 100-mile cheese options for Torontonians
(based on my own research):

• Salerno Dairy (Hamilton) for Italian-style cheeses
• Mornington Heritage Cheese (Millbank) and River's Edge Goat Dairy (Arthur) for goat's milk cheeses
• Upper Canada Cheese Company (Jordan Station) for single-herd cow's milk cheese
  
• Under 150 miles: Ivanhoe Cheese (Ivanhoe), Empire Cheese and Butter Cooperative (Campbellford), Eldorado Golden Cheese Company (Eldorado), Fifth Town Artisan Cheese Company (Picton),
  

Goodbye to summer

This really should be a blackberry and the background shouldn't be Parkdale but Metchosin but until I get the photos from my trip off my camera it will have to do...

I spent the last two weeks of August on Vancouver Island, a true "vacation" that climaxed with my brother's wedding on the first day of September (congrats to D & L!). Part of this trip, which will be detailed further this weekend, was devoted to discovering and enjoying local food and drink. This pursuit began nearly immediately when my dad insisted we stop to buy Silver Rill corn on the way home from the airport, then we stopped at a second farm market on Oldfield Road and I discovered that they grow figs in Victoria! And so kicked off an Island visit punctuated by delicious discoveries and tastings, including:

• mead (Sooke)
• blackberries (Galloping Goose Trail, Metchosin)
• corn (Saanich Peninsula)
• basil and yellow & green beans (backyard garden)
• apples (frontyard orchard)
• buffalo mozzarella (milk from Duncan, made in Courtenay)
• blueberries (between Duncan & Ladysmith)
• tomatillos (grown locally, bought at the Moss St. Market)
• golden beets (grown locally, Luxton Farmer's Market)
• garlic (Rocky Point Road, Metchosin)
• hard cow's milk cheese (Parksville)
• hard sheep's milk cheese (Cowichan Bay)
  

I also learned that you can invest in a cow at Little Qualicum Cheeseworks (Parksville), ate a very local-produce-friendly meal at The Superior (James Bay), and learned that my parents are planning an "100% Metchosin meal" (inspired by The 100-Mile Diet, whose authors they heard speak on Salt Spring Island). Needless to say, it was a wonderful visit.

I bought cheese in the park

Just call me the omelette-master (mistress?): I have figured out how to make a one-egg omelette, which is perfect as a second course for breakfast. My latest favourite filling (as seen above) is garlic-sauteed organic rainbow chard and fresh feta from Monforte Dairy, both of which I bought at the Trinity Bellwoods' farmers' market on Tuesday afternoon.

There's something fun about buying cheese in a park direct from the cheesemaker. But the Monforte Dairy cheese is no novelty: it's delicious. The feta I bought for $5 (which I later saw in a store for $8.99) is the best I've had this summer.

As you may remember, I was trying to track down Monforte's Halloumi earlier this summer but had no luck. Next week, though, the cheesemaker (who also tried to sell me on the merits of an unlabelled smoked cheese that I thought might be Halloumi) has promised to bring some to the market. If it's as good as the feta, that would be excellent...

What's Your Desert Island Cheese?

About two weeks ago, in his Toronto Life blog review of C5, one of the new restaurants in the newly "crystallized" Royal Ontario Museum, food critic James Chatto mentioned that his favourite cheese is mimolette:

I was sitting in the ROM’s new restaurant, C5, late last week, when the mimolette question arose yet again. Properly aged mimolette is one of my absolute favourite cheeses. A whole one looks like a beaten-up stone cannonball until you prize it open. Inside, the paste is dark orange and so firm that it’s better to dig out fragments with a wedge than try to cut it with a knife. The flavour is bizarrely rich, like aged gouda only much more so—like hazelnuts and caramel and condensed milk and salt—incredibly delicious and with a finish as long and intense as Göttedamarung. I think it would be my desert island cheese. Indeed, I have always imagined this was the cheese that Ben Gunn fantasized about and begged for after his sad marooning.

Which makes me wonder, what's your desert island cheese?* Post your preference in the comments and I'll try to figure out what mine is...

*provided, of course, that your island came with a way of keeping the cheese from melting...

Two Little Bits o' Cheese

Two recommendations from my co-worker J.G. in Vancouver that I will have to track down:

Ok, the name of the cheese at my dinner party was “Fleur D’Aunis”- I’m not sure how widely available it is but it was delicious. It had a strong smell to me but the taste was smooth, creamy and a little nutty.
The other one you need to try when you are out west is San Pareil from Little Qualicum cheeseworks on the Island. A. brought some in last week. It is sharp like a cheddar but soft.

Also, while I keep promising to make a pilgrimage to Toronto's infamous Cheese Boutique, I haven't yet. However, one of the bloggers over at Taste TO did recently and you can read her report here.

Mozzarella di Bufala Campana

Fresh Mozzarella di Bufala Campana

A couple facts from Wikipedia about "Buffalo Mozzarella":

• The Italian city of Aversa in the Italian province of Caserta is recognized as the origin of this cheese.
• It really is made from buffalo milk, the milk of water buffaloes that is.
• Asian water buffaloes were brought to Italy by Goths (as in Wisigoths) during the migrations of the early medieval period. They were widely used in plowing compact and watery terrains, both because their strength and the size of their hooves, which do not sink too deeply into moist soil.

A Fairburn Farm Water Buffalo (Duncan, BC)

With this kind of history, it's not surprising that "Mozzarella di Bufala Campana" has a Protected Designation of Origin but there are also American and Canadian cheesemakers who rely on water buffalo herds to produce an authentic-as-you-can-get new-world version. Even though imported Italian stuff is available in North America, the cheese doesn't have a good shelf life (it's maybe only ideal for 12-24 hours after opening) and is best used the day of purchase so these local producers may have a bit of an edge (when I get out to Vancouver Island at the end of August, I will try to find out if that's true).

I mention this because this cheese is an essential ingredient in Caprese salad (above), which because fresh tomatoes finally taste good (and are in season!) two-thirds of the office in which I work is obsessed with. So buy yourself some good tomatoes and this cheese, or find a good Italian restaurant and spend the extra money to get Buffalo mozzarella instead of the ordinary stuff. It's worth it.

Omeleterrific

Spinach Omelet for One (avec tomates)

Mark Bittman, aka the NY Times Minimalist, taught me to make a decent omelet. Previously, my attempts would end up scrambled but reading his recipe for "Spinach Omelet for One" in an older cookbook of his I have out from the library taught me a few things:

1. Use a good non-stick pan
2. Lightly beat the eggs (2 of them or 2 whites + 1 yolk)
   
3. Medium-high heat
4. Melt some butter in the pan
5. "When butter stops foaming and just begins to color, pour in the eggs"
6. Once the edges of the omelet begin to set, add the filling*; spreading it mostly down the middle of the egg
7. When the bottom is browned, you're ready to fold the omelet
8. a) If you're talented and brave, follow Bittman's cookbook directions for doing this without using your hands; b) Or, if you're not (like me), use a spatula and your fingers to fold the omelet in half to seal in the filling.
   
9. Cook for a little bit longer, then gently slide the omelet out of the pan and onto a plate
10. Eat immediately
    

* Steam spinach separately in advance for the filling (and toss with a bit of nutmeg according to Bittman) and sprinkle with goat cheese (according to me)

Saint Morgon vs. Cheap Feta

Saint Morgon: $6.99/200g at Fiesta Farms

One of the reasons I went nuts and bought three kinds of cheese yesterday was that it was pay day and I suddenly had a bit of money in my bank account (hooray for direct deposit!). Before most of it was funneled towards my VISA bill, I felt like treating myself and spending a bit of hard-earned cash on cheese -- especially in light of my last cheese purchase: a 123-gram piece of sub-par feta bought at the ultra-budget No Frills near my house for $2.18 (which may have been the cheapest piece of cheese for sale in the entire store) because I couldn't bear the thought of not eating any cheese for a week.

So what's the difference between cheap cheese and not-so-cheap cheese? It's probably not fair to compare these two particular cheeses since the two types are vastly different but I've been thinking about the price of cheese ever since laying eyes on the super-tiny tubs of $12.95 Salt Spring Island Chevre at Whole Foods and then seeing the $9.95 Buffalo Mozzarella yesterday at Fiesta Farms. I'm all for paying more to get a higher quality product. If there's anything I've learned reading food books and Gourmet magazine all summer it's that it's all about the ingredients. Case in point: the basil pesto I made with high-end, Whole Foods-purchased parmesan reggiano while housesitting for C. was one of the best pestos I've ever made (I was so proud of it that I made T. and W. try spoonfuls of it fresh out of the food processor).

Anyway, the cheap feta I've been eating in salad all week was fine - it was crumbly and salty and went well with my sweet, garlicky homemade dressing - but it didn't blow my mind. Since starting this cheese project, there have only been two cheese that have done that (metaphorically, of course): one was the anonymous pecorino I had back in May and the other was a free sample of a soft cheese I tried at Whole Foods while purchasing the aforementioned expensive parmesan. Both had overwhelming flavour and you didn't need to eat much to get a sense of that. The cheese I popped in my mouth at Whole Foods (straight because it was the last bit on the tray and there were no more crackers) was like a meal in a mouthful. That's worth paying for.

Desiring a similar treat, I shelled out $6.99 for Saint Morgon at Fiesta Farms and bought an Ace Bakery demi-baguette to eat with it. Even wrapped up in plastic and wax paper, it smelled mildly stinky (like sweaty socks, actually) and the labelling on the bottom of the package assured me that it was "affiné" (ripened). I tried some smeared on the bread after I'd squeezed all the fruit in the fridge. What I noticed first of all was that it was salty. The flavour was mild at first, then started to get stronger but was never overwhelming in the way I wanted it to be. No aftertaste, though, which is a good thing, and though it's a full-fat soft cheese, it wasn't too creamy-tasting either.

But was it worth the cost? I mean, I will eat it and enjoy it (I had some more this morning) but I probably won't buy it again. When you're cheese-shopping on a budget, as I am, I think you want better R.O.I. (return on investment). Which has made me think that I need to sample expensive cheeses before purchasing them. If my "cheap feta" had turned out to be crappy, which it wasn't, it wouldn't have mattered because I spent so little on it but I can't help but feel a little ripped-of by the Saint Morgon...

Note #1: that's not a real ant in the feta picture, it's plastic

Note #2: Maybe the Saint Morgon just isn't meant for eating on bread. The Juniper Grill & Wine Bar in Orangeville uses it in a cooked appetizer: "Escargots, mushroom & Saint Morgon cheese perogy with sorrel sauce" (only $9 if you're willing to make the drive out of town and the rest of the menu looks good, too)

My fridge is all fromage & fruit

Went raspberry-picking at Spring View Farms in the hamlet of Leaskdale yesterday afternoon with B. Very cute "chemical-free" farm about 80km north of Toronto that does U-Pick strawberries, blackcurrants, and raspberries. (I'd tried to go there two weeks ago with S.W. and M. for strawberries but they were sold out so had to pick at Twinkle Berry Farm down the road.) We didn't have much time for picking because we only had a car co-op Yaris until 5:30pm and we didn't get to the farm until almost 3pm but we still picked 9 pints! And the berries are delicious. After I returned the car (and broke my cellphone by dropping it!), I walked up to look at a room for rent near Dupont & Christie, along the way picking up the cherries, strawberries, and blueberries I'd left in the fridge at work on Thursday.

The room for rent was cute and little red house on Clinton had potential (lots of room, cheap rent, a designated "sewing room", backyard, basement with laundry...) but it didn't feel quite right for me. However, it was just a two-minute walk away from one of my favourite Toronto supermarkets: Fiesta Farms (which, if you remember, is the place I spent nearly $75 as a pre-birthday present to myself) . This store is a sort of Italian/organic grocery-store heaven: they have an entire aisle devoted to pasta & sauce, their selection of olive oils and balsamic vinegars is amazing, they have great produce, tonnes of reasonably priced organic "staples," and a not-bad selection of cheese. So, not only do I have a tonne of fruit in my fridge, I also have 3 new kinds of cheese to taste this weekend:

• Saint Morgon: a soft ripened cheese from Choisy Le Roi, France (website in Norwegian)
  
  
• Capriny: a soft unripened goat's milk cheese from Saint-Raymond de Portneuf, Quebec
  
  
• Doré-Mi: a semi-soft unripened cheese from Montreal, Quebec*

* labelled as "The Perfect Cheese to Grill," which means I will be calling up B. (once I have a phone again) and asking if we can grill it on her rooftop-deck BBQ...

Reading is almost as good as eating

I've been on a huge reading-about-food binge of late. If you were to peruse the list of books (and magazines) I've borrowed from the Toronto Public Library over the last six months, you'd think I'd abandoned fiction altogether (not true).

The three best* non-fiction titles I've come across this year are (in the order I read them):

• Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany by Bill Buford
  
• The 100-Mile Diet by Alissa Smith & J.B. MacKinnon
• Julie and Julia: 365 days, 524 recipes, 1 tiny kitchen by Julie Powell**

* By "best," I mean most interesting and best-written. Cookbooks don't count, though if they did honorable mentions would go to Raw by Charlie Trotter (in which the photos are amazing; I haven't actually made anything from the book) and Fresh Food Fast: Delicious, Seasonal Vegetarian Meals in Under an Hour by Peter Berley (again, haven't made anything from this book but I was flagging so many recipes to photocopy when I was reading it that I think I have to buy the book).

**Related to the last title, which is all about cooking EVERY SINGLE RECIPE in Julia Child's infamous Mastering the Art of French Cooking, I just stumbled across the Smithsonian Museum of American History's online exhibit of Julia Child's kitchen. It's fascinating and worth checking out (especially since the museum itself is closed for renovations until 2008).

Cheeses I Have Eaten This Summer

Some highlights from the first half of the summer...

Fig & Feta Salad:

Probably with pecans and pears
Maple Cheddar:
231-kilometre cheese

Maple Cheddar (closeup):
you can see the crumbly texture

Gluten-free Cheese & Tomato-filled Crepes:
Made with organic quinoa flour

Gluten-Free Crepes (interior):
I think that's Black River X-tra Old Cheddar
Black River Extra Old Cheddar:
Very sharp, almost tangy flavour

Asparagus & Red Pepper Crustless Quiche (pre-cooked):
With goat cheese, naturellement

The Cheapest Goat's Milk Cheese at my No Frills:
My #3 Choice for Chevre

The Most Local Goat's Milk Cheese at my No Frills:
My #2 choice for Chevre

The Not-Local & Most-Expensive Goat's Milk Cheese at my No Frills:
My #1 choice for Chevre (it's the best tasting!)

"Grilled" Cheese

I was introduced to the concept of barbecued cheese by K. in Montreal two summers ago. She used to host wonderful weekly all-comers' barbecues and if you were a vegetarian who arrived early enough there might be some grilled halloumi up for grabs before the grill became dominated by meat. Halloumi is Cypriot in origin and is typically made with sheep's milk or goat's milk (or a blend). It's similar to mozzarella but chewier and usually saltier. Halloumi can be fried or grilled quite successfully due to its higher-than-normal melting point (according to Wikipedia, this from "the fresh curd being heated before being shaped and placed in brine"). When I found out that the place I was going to be housesitting for a couple weeks had a BBQ, I decided that I had to track down some halloumi of my own and invite some friends over to try it...

THE BARBECUED CHEESE EXPERIMENT

Hypothesis: That halloomi grilled on the barbecue will be delicious

Procedure:

1. Ride your bike to several high-end food stores looking for the Ontario halloumi you read about recently, which its makers tout as being "the only 100% sheep’s milk Halloumi made in Canada."

2. Strike out at Pusateri's, All the Best Fine Foods, and Whole Foods but sample several delicious cheeses during the (re)search -- including David Wood's Salt Spring Island goat cheese that certain Toronto foodies are excited about since it hit stores recently.

3. Forty-five minutes before guests are to arrive, fly into your last-chance grocery store. Luck out: not only does Loblaws have President's Choice "Halloom" in stock but it's on sale for $4.99. Grab two packages.

4. Back at home, set up barbecue and wait for B. to arrive because she has previous cheese-barbecuing experience (and also the matches needed to light the barbecue). Distract guests with sweet-potato hummous and potato salad while awaiting B's arrival.

5. On advice of B, have W. cut cheese into slices and soak in olive oil. Appoint another friend to quarter lemons (so that they can be squeezed over hot cheese).

6. Try grilling cheese directly on the BBQ, which is only moderately successful (let's just say, it sticks) but friends still say it's delicious when they try it.

7. Decide that B. was right: it might be better to just pan fry the cheese so scavenge around until you find a cast-iron frying pan (it's still barbecuing even if you use a pan).

8. Figure out that the pan works pretty well (but still some sticking) and that putting lots of oil in the pan makes it even better.

9. Serve cheese to everyone present and conclude that hypothesis was correct: the halloumi is delicious...

YUM!

10. Plan to repeat experiment to doublecheck findings.

For another story of barbecuing halloumi (with prettier pictures), check out 101 Cookbooks.

Note: Halloumi is Cypriot but the Greeks also do a version of fried cheese: it's called Saganaki and typically uses Kefalograviera, Kasseri, or sheep's milk feta.

A cheesy apology

Sorry for the lack of cheeseblogging the last few weeks... oops, month.

Stay tuned for another "cheese digest" and a detailed account of barbecuing cheese! Just in time for Canada Day.

If you need something to do in the meantime, may we recommend browsing a collection of French cheese labels? (It's en français)

Long-weekend Agritourism

Because it's a long weekend, four of us decided to borrow an Autoshare car and spend a whole Saturday driving around Prince Edward County (a two-hour drive from Toronto) visiting cute small towns and other stops along the area's "Taste Trail." It ended up being a lot of time in the car but we did visit two wineries, a cidery, and a cheese factory.

Black River Cheese in Milford was our last stop and though the cheese "factory" wasn't open for tours, they did have lots of free samples (the Garlic mozzarella and Salsa cheddar were two of the more interesting ones available for tasting). I was excited to discover the ice-cream cooler of "cheese ends" and dug through it to find some small pieces of (yet another) extra old cheddar (Cheese No. 19) and some mozzarella (Cheese No. 20) because I want to make pizza. B. was more adventurous with her cheese purchases: she bought a piece of the garlic mozzarella and also purchased a twenty-dollar gift basket just so she could snag one of the last pieces of maple cheddar available for sale, which my co-worker C. had raved about to me and which it turns out they only make in March (they told us that usually they don't have any left by this time of year).

The Black River looks like a nice place for swimming