Week 29 - Catching up with Dominic and Byron again!
Boy, am I behind. Not on having cheese nights, just recounting them. Any excuse aside, life just gets in the way sometimes. Byron and Dominic had me over for our weekly John Oliver catch up, and to introduce me to Stranger Things. By now, if you haven't even at least heard of Stranger Things you are living under a rock. It's Netflix's nod to everything 80's; the nostalgia (being home when the street lights came on, walkie talkies), the movies (E.T., Poltergeist, anything Stephen King wrote), or Winona Ryder's comically over acting (was she ever really that good? Like, really?). It's 8 hours of really great TV. Obviously I'm a fan. *Awaits patiently for season 2*
Two episodes of highly addicting television, and four cheeses later, brings us to week 29. Dominic was kind enough to (again) grab the cheeses for the evening, and I bitched (again) about having to review so many. Seriously, I don't know what my problem is. It's like I'm highly spoiled or something. And all of the cheeses were really interesting to boot.
The cheeses: São Jorge Point Reyes' Toma Cordobes Mitica Mimolette
São Jorge: Is a semi-hard cow's milk cheese, aged for three months, from the São Jorge region of the Azores archipelago of Portugal. Cheese production is a pillar of the island's economy, production dating as far back as settlement and the transportation of dairy cattle. The production of this cheese is no joke. In addition to DPO standards the cheese making process (sounds) complicated and highly selective.
São Jorge is made with raw cow's milk, the milk turns into curd, and I'm just going to let Wikipedia take it from here for a moment because I literally cannot, "after catalysing by acidification, from a lacto-serum obtained from previous manufacturing.
The curd thus achieved is left to stand until the mass has reached the desired consistency, then extract locto-serum, focusing on the dry mass, to which is added refined good quality salt, at the ratio of 2.8% by weight...The cheese is then dried in chambers to cure at ambient temperature over the following months, then on to acclimatized chambers, where they remain for the 90 days." After those bad boys goes through all of that, they still have to pass through a "chamber of tasters", which, seriously, how do I obtain this position? I feel like I could be very good at it. Only after the cheese has passed that is it available to be sold on the market.
So, going back a step, I needed to know what lactoserum is. And you know what? It's pretty much a fancy fucking word for whey. So there you go. It's also good for the va-jay. The more you know. São Jorge has sort of a strong smell, almost funk like, but has a much more mild taste, buttery with tangy notes. We were drinking it with a cheap-y bottle of wine but I'd imagine, being from Portugal, that this would pair nicely with a nice Port wine.
Point Reyes Toma: Point Reyes Toma is a semi-hard cow's milk cheese, aged for 3 months from Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese Company in California. Sound kind of familiar? I forgot to mention that this cheese and the São Jorge are pretty similar. Not only in how they look, yellow-white with natural rinds and holes (eyes), but how they taste, buttery with a hint of tang at the end. They are made differently, Toma is a vegetarian cheese, made with a microbial rennet. It's a family owned farm, Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese Company opened in 2000 after a family long history of raising Holstein cows and selling their milk to local farmers. This is the family's second cheese, their flagship being Original Blue. Toma is a lighter cheese, it pairs well with nuts or fruit, but can also hold up to a hoppy beer.
Cordobes Mitica: There's not a whole lot of history I can give you on this cheese. It's a sheep's milk cheese, using Castellana and Merino sheep, sold exclusively to Whole Foods by Mitica. That's about all I got. It's on the mild side, and like a typical sheep's milk cheese has a dryer texture. It paired nicely with the red we have, other folks who have tried it liked it with things the the fruitier side, with cherries or a Moscato.
Mimolette: I saved this baby for last because I just had to. Not only because it's bright ass orange, but because of what I found out about it after doing my reading. Don't get me wrong, this was the favorite of the night, not only because we were fascinated by it's color, but also because it just tastes really great. The cheese has a hard rind, I knew immediately it was inedible and cut it off. Good job me. Mimolette is a hard cow's milk cheese aged anywhere from 2 months to two years. Traditionally, Mimolette is produced in Lille, France (also known there as Boule de Lille or vieux Hollande), but can be found produced all over Europe. Mimolette originally was made at the request of Louis XIV, who was looking for a French cheese to replace the popular Edam. As a way to distinguish this new cheese from Edam he seasoned it with annatto, giving the cheese a sweet and nutty flavor and that squash-orange color.
The cheese is made into balls that very much resemble a cantaloupe. Cool right? Well, that rough pattern that the rind has is from cheese mites. Yeah, you read that right. Cheese mites. Intentionally added to the rind for added flavor. I looked up what other cheeses have cheese mites and this is the only one. In 2013, the FDA had to limit the amount in which this cheese could be sold, the fear being in large doses the mites causing allergic reactions. Super happy we didn't accidentally eat the rind on this one. But, like I said, all things aside, its a might fine tasting cheese.
Until next time all, don't let the cheese mites bite!