Cheese, Friend or Foe?
Jan. 5th, 2007 12:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dwivianAs asked here:
The East refers to cheese as "spoiled milk" and won't eat it. They also eat fermented cabbage, which the West finds quite confusing. Clearly food is a matter of regional taste. I don't know the state of cheese in politics, nor if it has ever been thrown at a family planning clinic. It seems to be non-controversial, at least in the West.
In my region, cheese is a good thing. I have a member of my chosen family that refuses to have anything to do with it, which is odd to me but I understand, and we don't take him to Melting Pot. At least, not yet. Maybe he'll warm up to the other courses. No, for me, cheese is part of my history, and my present.
Growing up I got the experience of both the plastic-wrapped cheese (which I would fold in half, repeatedly, until it was a stack 2n tall), and the government cheese (which may or may not be sliced, and I saw no rhyme nor reason why the boxes varied). And, of course, I got the box mac-n-cheese, with the powdered cheese food substance. Being asked which kind of cheese mostly meant orange or white, with flavors not so distinct. Oh, there was cream cheese occasionally (mostly as spreads for crackers), and traditional swiss, but to a child's palate that means "bitter cheese" so I didn't like it. I just wanted the regular orange stuff, thank you.
Except.....
There was this place just north of our house, in a really short drive, that had Danish Havarti and crisps that taste of cardboard on their own but are perfect as a foundation for the texture and flavor of properly paired cheeses. My mother introduced me to it one day. I don't know if they still carry that cheese particularly (Dofino) but it meant the world to me. It is a memory that I cherish, not only because the store was in the foothills (and thus was nestled in a gorgeous space), but because it meant doing something fantastic, flavorful, and family.
I occasionally ask for those crackers, still, and my Mom will make a special trip to get them for me. I don't think I'm out, but just in case, I think I'll have to ask again soon. I did learn that American is *NOT* a good pairing, by the way. ::shudder::
In High School a specialty store opened in our little town (under 2000 people). It was so good at being nestled out of the way that it closed for lack of business. It carried lumps of stuff they called cheese, but it wasn't anything like I'd seen before. Since they were going out of business, I bought lots of it, which got warm on the bike ride back to the house. No matter... it was good. And gouda. And havarti, and colby, and muenster, and gruyere, and....
...and.... they were closed and I couldn't get any more. The best I could get was the holiday sampler from Hickory Farms, and only at Christmas. Blast! I kept the labels for a while so I could remember what I liked.
It was college before I has better access to different cheeses (by way of a well stocked grocery) and thus started paying attention to what varieties of cheese there were, and why cheddar melts funny (unless you coat it in flour, something I learned much later), and the main differences between hard and soft cheese, old and young cheese, mold strains and why bleu cheese is so good melted on red meats....
But, I was a college student. Cheese like I wanted was a bit out of my price range. And so it remained a special thing, added to some dishes, cut and set aside on its own other days. I learned to stretch it between meals, creating cheese sauces from leftover blocks to use on noodles. Even now I know a pathway from cheese party to fondue to cheese spread to cheese dough to spicy baked cheese sticks.
When I moved away from my full-time college days, and took on a job, I started having money enough to keep cheese on hand. Alas, my profession kept me out of my kitchen enough that I owned lots of moldy cheese but none that were meant to be that way. I stopped buying the stuff because it seemed dumb to have a just-less-than-one-pound block of mold to throw away over and over.
Then I found out where my local farmer's market was, and it had a cheese shop like the one of my youth... and they sold cuts as small as I might ever want. And so....
I began cooking things I would see on Public TV weekends, with all the cooking shows and people using things I suddenly could afford to have. I bought good kitchen gear, excellent ingredients, and, of course, fine cheese.
My fondue went from being glop cheddar to a blend of asiago veccio and gruyere, with fine ground mustard and white pepper thrown in for flavor (and it still makes a great cheese stick if it gets that far, and if not, amazing mac-n-cheese). My omlettes are less southwest and much more french, with fine flavors and spice. I have learned to make parmisano reggiano crisps on a silpat, and have enjoyed them on more than one occasion. I haven't shunned cheddar, but I make it work for me. And I have intentionally spoiled milk to make fresh cheese (and it takes quite a bit of nerve to throw vinegar into warm milk to watch it curdle, after having had several gallon jugs spontaneously go bad while I was away on travel). I have tried buffalo cheese, beer cheese, baked brie (a favorite), and hundreds of others.
Dofino (well, to be fair, any young danish havarti) is still the best, but the memories are what makes it so.
And, to this day, I still harbor a fantasy of buying a wheel of cheese and a big knife, and throwing a "cut off your own chunk" party. When the house is clean, the budget is sane, and I have a few hundred dollars to spare..... want an invite?
The East refers to cheese as "spoiled milk" and won't eat it. They also eat fermented cabbage, which the West finds quite confusing. Clearly food is a matter of regional taste. I don't know the state of cheese in politics, nor if it has ever been thrown at a family planning clinic. It seems to be non-controversial, at least in the West.
In my region, cheese is a good thing. I have a member of my chosen family that refuses to have anything to do with it, which is odd to me but I understand, and we don't take him to Melting Pot. At least, not yet. Maybe he'll warm up to the other courses. No, for me, cheese is part of my history, and my present.
Growing up I got the experience of both the plastic-wrapped cheese (which I would fold in half, repeatedly, until it was a stack 2n tall), and the government cheese (which may or may not be sliced, and I saw no rhyme nor reason why the boxes varied). And, of course, I got the box mac-n-cheese, with the powdered cheese food substance. Being asked which kind of cheese mostly meant orange or white, with flavors not so distinct. Oh, there was cream cheese occasionally (mostly as spreads for crackers), and traditional swiss, but to a child's palate that means "bitter cheese" so I didn't like it. I just wanted the regular orange stuff, thank you.
Except.....
There was this place just north of our house, in a really short drive, that had Danish Havarti and crisps that taste of cardboard on their own but are perfect as a foundation for the texture and flavor of properly paired cheeses. My mother introduced me to it one day. I don't know if they still carry that cheese particularly (Dofino) but it meant the world to me. It is a memory that I cherish, not only because the store was in the foothills (and thus was nestled in a gorgeous space), but because it meant doing something fantastic, flavorful, and family.
I occasionally ask for those crackers, still, and my Mom will make a special trip to get them for me. I don't think I'm out, but just in case, I think I'll have to ask again soon. I did learn that American is *NOT* a good pairing, by the way. ::shudder::
In High School a specialty store opened in our little town (under 2000 people). It was so good at being nestled out of the way that it closed for lack of business. It carried lumps of stuff they called cheese, but it wasn't anything like I'd seen before. Since they were going out of business, I bought lots of it, which got warm on the bike ride back to the house. No matter... it was good. And gouda. And havarti, and colby, and muenster, and gruyere, and....
...and.... they were closed and I couldn't get any more. The best I could get was the holiday sampler from Hickory Farms, and only at Christmas. Blast! I kept the labels for a while so I could remember what I liked.
It was college before I has better access to different cheeses (by way of a well stocked grocery) and thus started paying attention to what varieties of cheese there were, and why cheddar melts funny (unless you coat it in flour, something I learned much later), and the main differences between hard and soft cheese, old and young cheese, mold strains and why bleu cheese is so good melted on red meats....
But, I was a college student. Cheese like I wanted was a bit out of my price range. And so it remained a special thing, added to some dishes, cut and set aside on its own other days. I learned to stretch it between meals, creating cheese sauces from leftover blocks to use on noodles. Even now I know a pathway from cheese party to fondue to cheese spread to cheese dough to spicy baked cheese sticks.
When I moved away from my full-time college days, and took on a job, I started having money enough to keep cheese on hand. Alas, my profession kept me out of my kitchen enough that I owned lots of moldy cheese but none that were meant to be that way. I stopped buying the stuff because it seemed dumb to have a just-less-than-one-pound block of mold to throw away over and over.
Then I found out where my local farmer's market was, and it had a cheese shop like the one of my youth... and they sold cuts as small as I might ever want. And so....
I began cooking things I would see on Public TV weekends, with all the cooking shows and people using things I suddenly could afford to have. I bought good kitchen gear, excellent ingredients, and, of course, fine cheese.
My fondue went from being glop cheddar to a blend of asiago veccio and gruyere, with fine ground mustard and white pepper thrown in for flavor (and it still makes a great cheese stick if it gets that far, and if not, amazing mac-n-cheese). My omlettes are less southwest and much more french, with fine flavors and spice. I have learned to make parmisano reggiano crisps on a silpat, and have enjoyed them on more than one occasion. I haven't shunned cheddar, but I make it work for me. And I have intentionally spoiled milk to make fresh cheese (and it takes quite a bit of nerve to throw vinegar into warm milk to watch it curdle, after having had several gallon jugs spontaneously go bad while I was away on travel). I have tried buffalo cheese, beer cheese, baked brie (a favorite), and hundreds of others.
Dofino (well, to be fair, any young danish havarti) is still the best, but the memories are what makes it so.
And, to this day, I still harbor a fantasy of buying a wheel of cheese and a big knife, and throwing a "cut off your own chunk" party. When the house is clean, the budget is sane, and I have a few hundred dollars to spare..... want an invite?
no subject
Date: 2007-01-06 06:57 pm (UTC)