To me, there are few things more appealing than a cheese tray. Gooey, crumbly, veined, stinky, waxed, mold-crusted; I'll take them all. I guess it's a good thing I live where I do, because--after California--Wisconsin is the biggest producer of cheese in the United States. AND, if you measure by the amounts of award-winning, artisan cheese, we're the biggest producer--take that Golden State!Saturday afternoon we were pleased to host Jeanette Hurt, the author of The Cheeses of Wisconsin. She signed the book and taught a class on cheese pairings--with wine, with fruits and nuts, with various spreads. Very interesting and, man, did we fill up.
We tasted: Crave Brothers' Petit Freres (my fave, a soft cow's milk cheese); Carr Valley's Cocoa Cardona; Hook's Basic Blue; Hook's Sweet Constantine; Country Castle's Limburger. The Sweet Constantine was delicious on bread with a little smear of fig jam; the blue was perfect with Double D's Honey; and we spread mustard on the Limburger and it was very nice, and not too smelly.
We hope to have Jeanette back later in the spring to do a class on Tapas, so stay tuned!
2 comments:
Brenda, I loved coming to your store, and I'm looking forward to returning. One quick thing I want to tell you - Wisconsin is second in overall milk production to California, but Wisconsin is number one in cheese production while California is second. In fact, Wisconsin is the fifth largest cheese producing region in the world.
Some people are predicting that California may surpass Wisconsin in cheese, but others don't believe that will happen.
Thanks for the clarification, Jeanette. I knew I should have double-checked my facts. I remember Californian dairy producers crowing about their number 1 status, when I was living in Los Angeles, but that must have been for milk production.
Fifth largest in the world...that's crazy! I guess I ought to replace my cheese-head koozy--the orange plastic had discolored to an unappetizing brown. Showing some pride AND keeping my beer cold!
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