So my friends Marbree (lawyer) and Jen (nutritionist) came over and low and behold – Marbree baked us an amazing fresh bread. Here’s the deal – she just had a crazy back surgery and has been stuck at home with nothing to do, so she’s been baking like crazy. AND she actually has been watching my show (hey at least there’s 1 fan!) and saw that folks said we should be eating the cheese with bread not crackers.
Let me just pause and say not only was it a beautiful piece of bakery, but also delicious. I seriously need to take baking lessons from this lady.
Ok so actually I went a little cheese crazy on our trip out to the Berkshires and had a few cheeses left over so that’s what we ate.
We started with:
1.Tobasi from Cricket Creek Farm – always nice to get a second (and third) opinion on a cheese. Jen did point out it’s general B.O. smell- and I must say – the cheese was very good with the bread – I wanted to make a George Forman grilled cheese right there.
2.Bardwell Farm Cave to Coop – OK so this one actually came from Shelburne Falls in the Pioneer Valley, famous for its swimming glacial potholes and hilarious/retro/but kinda cool flowering bridge. It’s one of those unique places that for some reason attracted a lot of artists and is just kinda cool.
I was totally stoked to find this cheese because I had contacted Christopher Kimball from America’s Test Kitchen on twitter (so web 2.0!) about which was his favorite locally made cheese and he said Bardwell farm – which I guess is close to his house.
Strangely enough – I can’t find the name of this cheese on their website, but from pictures and descriptions, I believe we tried their Dorset cheese- described on their website as:
DORSET A washed-rind, raw Jersey cow milk cheese. A soft ripening cheese with a rich, buttery texture and seasonally influenced pungency. An elegant appetizer or dessert, often served here in the historic village of Dorset, VT. Available year-round in 2.5 pound wheels.
This cheese won a ton of awards in 2008 also.
We liked it.
3.Berkshire Blue – So this was the cheese that I was stalking the entire trip. When you type in “Berkshires” and “Cheese” in Google – this is the first cheese that comes up. So we basically had to drive all over the place and eventually found it at the Wild Oats Market in Williamstown. Gotta love those yuppie co-ops in mega-rich college towns. – what a cheese spread!
This Cheese was mild and fabulous. Worth the hours of stalking.
What do you do with Blue Cheese?
Ok – So Marbree, not a fan of blue cheeses, brought up a good question – what do you do with blue cheese?
Side note: I’ve loved the taste of Blue ever since I was a kid because the only salad dressing my Mom kept around was Marie’s Blue Cheese….
So Bob just bought me a fabulous new book – I highly recommend it: the World Cheese Book by Juliet Harbutt.
Here’s what she has to say about what to do with Blue:
“Uncooked Blue Cheeses are essential on any cheese platter (um….ok). Also they add another dimension to salad especially when crumbled over flageolet beans (what?), walnuts, and peppery arugula dressed with a honey vinaigrette (ok that was painfully food snobbyish). Walnut bread is especially good with blue cheese and a drizzle of honey brings out the subtlety of the cheese.
Cooked: Stir small amounts into pasta, soups, and sauces to elevate dishes into classics like celery and Stilton soup (sooooo classic ?); pasta and pinenuts; or grilled steak with blue cheese sauce.
Wine: sweet or dry Riesling or late bottled Port (don’t know what that means).”
I guess that’s a pretty useful description…she did leave off buffalo wings….
The CheeseFreak 