Hello everybody! This week, quite simply, was delicious. We had four wonderful cheeses, each quite distinctive but equally tasty.
Starting on the upper left, we had Red Apple Cheese Applewood Smoked Gruyere. This is a favorite around these parts. It is more of a mild Gruyere, with a texture that straddles the line between semi-soft and firm. The smokiness is strong, but not overpowering, and provides a wonderful match to the cheese. Good stuff.
On the lower left we had Ski Queen Gjetost. Damn, I love this cheese! Gjetost is made from the whey instead of the curds, unlike most cheeses. They boil it to caramelize the lactose which makes it taste like cheese and fudge combined into one divine bite. I think that I ate half of this all by myself. And I’m not ashamed.
In the middle we had Kaltbach Emmentaler. This is Swiss cheese, made by the Swiss, in the original manner, and my goodness is it delicious. It has a much stronger flavor and aroma than Americanized Swiss cheese, being much closer to a strong Gruyere or Comté than the stuff that gets called Swiss cheese by virtue of having holes in it. Very yummy stuff, indeed.
Lastly, on the right is McCall’s Shamrock Porter Cheese, a beer cheddar. They mix the beer in with the curds before making the cheese, which is what leads to the marbling that you see. It has a bit of the bitter flavor that you’d get from the beer, but it is mixed with the mild cheddar bite, making for a nice combination of the two tastes.
There really was no clear winner today, although I am personally enamored with the Gjetost. It was simply a yummy, yummy day.
Stay cheesy!