A blog dedicated to urban cheesemaking, cheese tasting and appreciation and all things cheese and dairy related.
Chevre des Cremiers, a bloomy-rind goat’s milk cheese, double- or triple-creme (I’m not sure which but there’s definitely some extra creme goin’ on here!). Hailing from Midi-Pyrenees, France, the wheel is plump and velvety with the pillowy amber-snowy rind collapsing around the oozing paste.
A mild, milky, buttery cheese, smooth and creamy with a nice saltiness, with hints of hay, mushrooms and mustiness and just the slightest hint of goat bite and a slightly sour finish.
Purchased at Blue Apron.
Goat Cheese Frosting on your cupcake, anyone? Belle Chevre posts 30-second “Chevre Shorts” recipes on YouTube, here’s the latest.
Bleu du Bocage, from the Vendée in the Loire Region of France, and one of the cheeses lovingly aged in the caves of Murray’s. One’s mind might go to the assertive and biting Spanish Cabrales when goat and blue are mentioned in the same breath, but the Bleu du Bocage is surprisingly mellow, with just enough spice.
With a smooth, buttery body lightly veined with greenish-blue and yellow mold, the sweet and grassy paste contrasts nicely with the spice and subtle barnyard bite of the bluing, with undertones of fruitiness, nuts and minerality.
Purchased at Murray’s.
The latest batch of Gowanish, at around 3 weeks. I used a slightly different recipe this time around, and included Aroma B Mesophilic in the starter mix. This did change the flavor — Aroma B is often used in the making of cream cheese, and the Gowanish did have a slightly cream-cheesy tang to it. I’m not sure if it was the Aroma B (it could be, because Aroma B produces CO2, which can give the cheese a fluffier texture) but the paste also had a scattering of air pockets, I wouldnt call them eyes exactly, which might also have been due to the curds being slightly harder than ideal at scooping time so that they didnt knit together perfectly in the molds.
Overall I was pleased with the flavor; the rind was a little saltier than I like but the paste was creamy and fudgy in texture, with a creamline that was soft and oozing, but not so liquid that it just spilled out as soon as the room temperature pyramid was cut open. This was also the first time using a new milk supplier from a farm in PA, and it was extremely fresh, bright and sweet out of the bottle, which definitely came through in the cheese.
In the next batch I’m going to pull back on the Penicillium Candidum somewhat, go for more of a 1/1 Geotrichum and Penicillium. I’ll also watch the curds more hawkishly to avoid over-coagulating in the vat.
Chabichou du Poitou is a little tower of goaty goodness from the Poitou-Charentes region of central western France.
About 3” in height and 2” wide, with a crinkly, firm outer rind and a dense, fudgy, slightly chalky interior paste. A mild but complex cheese with a wonderful mouthfeel and a delicate, minerally, tangy flavor with a mild goaty pungency and notes of grass and citrus. A wonderful cheese to pair with most any white wine.
Purchased at Blue Apron Foods.
Petite Mothais, also Mothais Sur Feuille (translation: Mothais on a Leaf), a goat’s milk bloomy rind from Poitou-Charentes in western France. Wrapped in a Chestnut leaf and aged at higher than normal humidity (close to 100% rather than 85-90%), resulting in a high-moisture, delicate-rinded wheel with a wonderfully velvety paste and an oozing creamline. The rind will sometimes be dotted with a few spots of blue mold, which is normal.
In flavor the young Mothais is buttery and light, earthy and herbaceous with a subtle goatiness. A wonderful addition to any cheese plate.
Purchased at the Artisanal cheese counter.
First layers of snowy mold pushing through on the Gowanus Ash pyramids.
The “Gowanus Ash” bloomie goat, out of the molds and getting ashed before going back into the “cave” for aging.
Reblogged from fromaginaire:
Couronne Lochoise.
Ring of fire or Ring of cheese ?
The Couronne was one of the cheeses I had at La Cloche à Fromage in Strasbourg, it’s the half donut in the upper left of the cheese plate in this post.
The visually striking Robiola di Capra Incavolata, a goats-milk Robiola wrapped in leaves of Savoy Cabbage and tied with straw. I was hoping to buy a little wedge to try it but it was mislabeled (damn you Whole Foods!), and is available by the whole wheel only, so I had to pass, but couldn’t resist taking a picture. We’ll meet again, my cabbage-wrapped friend…
Also written up in the NYTimes.
