My favorite recipes
The A’s were in town for Columbus Day, so we had to do Italian. One of the six pizzas: Spinacholi — spinach, broccoli, fresh mozzarella cheese. M has the crust down just right. All the veggies from the local farmer’s market, and the cheese (and prosciutto from the Cleveland Park Special Pizza — prosciutto, mushrooms, spinach, mozzarella) were from Vace’s. Turkish Coffee included a period of calm before craziness and another giraffe.
Old Man Highlander is a Gouda-style cheese produced in 8 lb wheels and naturally ripened for 6-9 months from Calkins Creamery, Honesdale, PA. I picked it up with a friend, KK, who had never been in Cowgirl Creamery DC. Nathan, our cheesemonger, could not have been nicer. KK loved the place, and I got my CounterCulture coffee, too, along with this cheese of the week (though still $24.55 a pound — KK didn’t know there was cheese that cost that much). But it was hard to say what I liked better — the cheese or the fresh figss WWT brought from North Carolina. They might be a bit better with a soft cheese like blue or brie, but, mmm… still very tasty — soft figs with a bit of hard cheese.
Cristal Ortiz is the winner of the 2009 Grilled Cheese Sandwich Recipe Contest called GRILLED SUDS N’ CHEESE Serves 4. From WSU blog per Julie.
Brunch in Lost City, West Virginia. Baked eggs with Sheep Gouda from Valley Shepherd Creamery in NJ with MT, TT, WT, AT. Eggs fresh from the chickens in the backyard hen house.
The author of I’m Not Hanging Noodles on your Ears says the Spanish way of saying “He’s pulling your leg” (deceiving you) is “He’s giving it to you with cheese.” Many of the world’s idioms revolve around food.
Story from jat –about Washington State University (WSU) grad Kurt Dammeier ’82 — the cheese evangelist and making cheese who owns Beecher’s Handmade Cheese at Seattle’s Pike Place Market. Written in winter 2004-2005.
Due to the recent family reunion, we asked JT to courier Cougar Gold from WSU. She brought one can of regular, and one of specially aged Cougar Gold. TT really liked the aged version. When it got back here, we tried it, but weren’t able to do a side-by-side comparison of the regular vs. the aged. Anyway, it was very good.
J&J brought us specially aged (3-year) Cougar Gold cheese, but security slowed them down when they carried on at the Spokane airport. They made it through, but it did take extra time.
May All your Days be Gouda. We knew it was Dairy Month – but Ken sent us this great card. Thanks, Ken.
“Morbier” means “small market town” in French. Morbier (full name Morbier du Livradois) is a mild-tasting cheese with a white pine ash layer in the middle of it. The cheese has a golden-brown rind. Inside, it is pale yellow, and semi-firm yet creamy and supple. It is made from unpasteurized cow’s milk. The milk is heated, then curdled. Traditionally, Morbier Cheese was made from leftover curd that wasn’t wanted for other cheeses or uses. The curd was put into a mould, then ash put over it to stop it from drying out and forming a rind until the next day, when there would be more leftover curd, enough to finish filling up the mould. Today, small producers will make the bottom layer from the evening’s milk, then the top layer from the next morning’s milk. It is then salted and pressed by law, it has to be aged a minimum of 45 days. Many, though, age it for two months. After this initial aging, it is then washed with brine, then aged another two months. Brought at local Brookville. It’s softish, and I was afraid a bit stinky at first — but it is actually pretty mild. They don’t know how cheesemakers learned to start adding the ash.
