WHAT IS EDAM? Once long ago, a semi-hard, sharp tasting farmhouse cheese was all the rage. But today Edam is an industrial cheese. Cannonball-shaped, this semi-hard cow’s milk cheese has a mildly spicy flavor and less rubbery texture then cheap gouda. The red wax is only for exports. Back home in the Netherlands they sell […]
cows milk
ARCHAEOLOGY OF CHEESE – Brillat-Savarin
WHO WAS BRILLAT-SAVARIN? At the end of the 19th century, Henri Androuet named this cheese after French gastronome and physiologist Brillat-Savarin. Born over 100 years earlier, he was the author of such famous statements as “Dessert without cheese is like a beauty with only one eye”. Think of him as the bachelor gourmet precursor to […]
ARCHAEOLOGY OF CHEESE – Reblochon
WHAT IS REBLOCHON? This fromage is made in the French Savoie region of France. Only the milk from Abondance, Montbeliard and Tarine cows is used. Reblochon is a bit unusual in that its rind is washed with whey. After the cheese has been aged for about a month, a nutty, yellow interior balances out the […]
ARCHAEOLOGY OF CHEESE – Gouda
WHAT IS GOUDA? This waxed Dutch cheese can be consumed from 1 month to 5 years old. It is almost always made from pasteurized cow’s milk and cooked curds. The traditional raw milk version is still made but under a different cheese (boerenkaas). Gouda is classified by age. The first of the 7 stages is […]
ARCHAEOLOGY OF CHEESE – Humboldt Fog
WHAT IS HUMBOLDT FOG? So Europe has a long tradition of cheese making. And for many years, there weren’t many non-European cheese that could compete. Humboldt Fog is a goat’s milk cheese created by Mary Keehn in the 1970’s and changed that. This soft-ripened cheese with its beauty mark line of ash gives even the […]
ARCHAEOLOGY OF CHEESE – Comte
WHAT IS COMTE? Do you know the remake of that Culture Club song “Comte Chameleon?” No, nor does anyone else, I just made it up (sigh, only 158 more words to write!) Comte had a huge influence on 19th century thought and seduced famous social activists like Karl Marx, Falco and John Stuart Mill. No […]
