This Cheese Doesn't Suck: Chimay Gold

  

    The monks of the Abbey of Notre-Dame de Scourmont, near the town of Chimay, Belgium have been producing their now famous beer and rich, cows milk cheese since the mid-19th century.  Needing to generate modest funds for the abbey, the monks settled on two things most people can't get enough of; alcohol and fatty, delicious dairy products.  What came out of their efforts became iconic.  Chimay beer and cheese of the same name are meant to be eaten together.  You'd be hard pressed to find a cheese enthusiast or beer snob that hasn't at least heard of Chimay.  

    Chimay Gold is an interesting offering from the brand.  Traditionally the monks cheeses were washed in local spring water.  Which helped to cultivate the pungent, sticky pink-y orange rind of Brevibacterium linens.  Yes, purposely cultivated bacteria on the out side of the cheese.  That rind of bacteria found on all washed rind cheese is what helps such cheeses develop their distinct strong flavors.  

    However, Chimay Gold, is washed instead in the abbey's own Chimay beer.  The results are glorious.  The cheese's texture is still the silky, sticky, chewy-ness of plain Chimay cheese.  However the flavor is turned up a notch.  Bring out creamy notes of hops, grain, sun-baked soil, and dry roasted peanut.

    Pair this cheese with its primary partner Chimay beer or any fine locally brewed pale ale.  

 

This Cheese Doesn't Suck: Haystack Mountain Queso de Mano

    Colorado is bursting with goat cheese makers these days.  Goats are a hardy creature well suited to the harsh climates of Colorado.  From perennial favorite Avalanche Cheese Company, to today's feature Haystack Mountain, there's a goat cheese for every taste.  

    Queso de Mano was the first raw milk offering from Haystack Mountain.  Drawing heavily from the goat and sheep cheese of Spain, Queso de Mano bears a strong resemblance to the famous Spanish goat cheese Garrotxa.  Starting with the vaguely fluffy, dusty grey rind, which carries with it a damp earthy/goaty aroma.  The paste of the cheese its self is supple and springy.  Giving way to a toothsome cream when young and a bit more dry fudge crumble when aged.  Flavors of blanched almond, sun dried grass, and minerals weave together to form a pleasing nod to those Spanish cheeses Queso de Mano is inspired by. 

    Aged 4 to 12 months makes this cheese perfectly in season for late summer.  Depending on the wheel, the milk used to produce Queso de Mano was made from either sweet spring grasses or the herbs and flowers of summer.  Either way this cheese wins and so do you. 
    Queso de Mano can be found regionally in the western U.S. and is perfect paired up with a locally brewed Colorado pale ale.

Vine Street Brews.

Lookit that lace.

Mountain Sun Brewery Bavarian Hefeweizen.  

 Playful citrus, clove, and candied banana notes.  Circus peanut even made a brief show.  All kickin' flavors when it comes to a well rounded Hef.  The only beer to end a 100 degree high desert day.  Pair with Humboldt Fog, Lamborn Bloomer or a nice puck of Capricho de Cabra

Preview Friday #2

My apologies for the radio silence, friends.  

Summer begs to be celebrated out of doors and, well, I just couldn't help myself.  

Here are a few raw photos to satisfy you until Monday.

This week won't be quite so quiet around The Board and Wire. 

Cheese. Meet People. People. Eat Cheese.

I have had a many years long love affair with cheese.  Ever since the Herve Mons class was given for my Whole Foods Market (WFM) Specialty Team, of which I was but a Team Member, at my Ann Arbor, MI store I have been hopelessly in lust with the stuff.  I won't wax poetic about knowing since childhood that cheese was my destiny (add dramatic flair here).  Because I didn't.  Cheese, until about 4 years ago, was a tasty condiment, right up there with ketchup, or a festive treat ala the Pepperidge Farms holiday cheese ball.  I did live for that cheese ball every Christmas, however.  Hardly the grounds for an adulthood cheese obsession.  
Frankly I had always thought my true calling was in academia.  Slogging through grading papers or lecturing on the finer points of the French Revolution.  It wasn't until having hauled my life across the country to be with the man of my dreams and a few unfulfilling jobs later that I resettled into the life of a Cheese Monger.  It was then, and really only then, I realized that what I loved doing (selling, eating, talking about, sharing cheese, etc.) could be a legitimate living.  I can have my cheese and eat it, too! (harhar)
Thus, here I am.  Shouting from my proverbial mountain top about all things curdy and delicious.  Lets be reasonable here though.  I cannot start a blog about cheese without filling you, dear reader, in about all the wonderful things associated with cheese.  Heavenly micro brewed beers, spicy compotes, more-than-your-average-Ritz crackers, shamefully good charcuterie...oh the list could go on and on.  My capacity to talk endlessly about food is only slightly less than my daily intake of oxygen.  That is to say it is vast.
Here I fully intend to channel the enthusiasm for cheese that causes my mothers eyes to glaze over after 15 minutes of steady verbal stream.  I bring you my best of cheese. Even my worst of cheese.  Blogging is, in essence, about opinions. When it comes to cheese, boy do I have them.
I also welcome your comments, ideas, and cheese you can't live without.  Without the reader this blog remains just another Internet foodie backwater.
So here's to the beauty of a good wheel of the moldy stuff in all of it's satisfyingly delicious forms.

What I'm Currently Eating. Rogue Creamery's Crater Lake Blue

The sun comes up over Cheese Island at The Mighty Arb where I got my start.