The Cheese Board (38 page)

One of our favorite tasks at the cheese counter is helping customers create interesting and unique cheese plates. When their number is called, they hand us their card and the conversation begins. “I’m having people over and I’d like to serve a cheese plate; can you give me some advice?”

While scanning the case with its huge selection of cheeses, we respond with questions of our own: “What types of cheese do you like?” “How many people are you serving and how adventurous are they?” “What is the occasion?” “How many types of cheese would you like to serve?” We’ll pull a cheese out of the case we think that they might like and give them a taste of it. From then on we are guided by their responses.

Our rule of thumb for the amount of cheese to serve is based on the number of people invited. For hors d’oeuvres, 1 to 2 ounces of cheese per person is sufficient. If the cheese is the centerpiece of a gathering or a meal, the amount should be 3 to 5 ounces per person. For a pre-dessert or dessert cheese course, a light 1-ounce serving per person is usually enough.

There are an almost infinite number of ways a cheese plate can be composed. Whether the selection is for a before-dinner cheese board, a cheese course preceding dessert, or a platter at a wedding reception, there are no hard-and-fast rules. The main things to keep in mind are that there should be variety and the cheeses should go well together.

Generally, we advise customers to select three to five cheeses for a cheese plate. You should love the cheeses you are buying, and the flavors should complement one another; from there the choices are endless. Customers have chosen the all-Italian cheese plate, a blue cheese sampler, a mixed-milk cheese plate (one cow’s milk, one goat’s milk, and one sheep’s milk cheese), or a same-milk cheese plate. Sometimes they just choose the cheese for aesthetic value: by shape and color. Your cheese selection should match your event, budget, and desires.

Baguettes, fruit, and simple crackers are ideal companions to cheeses. Choose other foods as a supporting cast to the cheeses and avoid overwhelming flavors. When serving wine with cheese, we feel that the rule is very simple: The wine should stand up to the flavors of the cheese and enhance them without overpowering them.

Plan to take the cheese plate out of the refrigerator an hour before serving it, as the flavor of cheese is more apparent at room temperature, and the texture, especially of soft cheeses, is more luxurious.

In this section you will find a variety of cheese plates based on different themes. The selections are chosen not only for their complementary flavors, but also because they represent some of our favorite cheeses. The descriptions provide a little information about each cheese, and some serving and individual cooking suggestions are included here and there.

Some of the world’s greatest cheeses are made with raw (unpasteurized) milk. Our customers request and crave these unique and flavorful cheeses; for many people, these cheeses are an experiential connection to the farmyard and a particular piece of countryside.

Raw-milk cheeses are usually made on a small scale with local raw milk, which has a complexity of flavor that is absent from the pasteurized product. The flavor of raw-milk cheese reflects the local geologic conditions that create the pasturage, weather conditions, and methods used to produce the cheese. These cheeses have what is called a “long” taste—that is, a taste that has many stages, each developing into distinct flavors that evolve and linger.

Many of these cheeses are rooted in history. Cheese is an ancient food, and its origins are documented as far back as seven thousand years. For example, English Cheshire has two thousand years of history behind it, and the Romans originally made Portuguese Serra da Estrela. These cheeses are not only delicious but are a
venerable food that supports a connection to a particular place and way of life.

The difference between raw and pasteurized cheese is that while raw-milk cheeses vary in the method of production, they all use milk that has not been heated to eliminate the native microflora. It is this diversity of microflora in raw-milk cheeses that results in their complex flavor. Both raw- and pasteurized-milk cheeses are inoculated with a starter culture of bacteria. In raw-milk cheeses, adding the starter culture to the lactic-acid bacteria that naturally exists in milk gives the cheese maker greater control of the fermentation process. With pasteurized-milk cheeses, it is necessary to replenish the lactic-acid bacteria killed during pasteurization (in addition to its flavor attributes, this bacteria plays a vital role in the curdling and aging of the cheese). But since the starter culture has no connection to the microbes previously present in the raw milk, it produces a blander, more uniform flavor in the cheese. The ripening process is slower for pasteurized-milk cheese, which again produces a milder, less complex flavor.

In the United States, cheeses made with pasteurized milk became the standard during World War II for a variety of reasons. A shortage of experienced cheese makers and an increased market for cheese resulted in a rising amount of factory-made cheese. Large-scale production required the use of milk from many sources, which in turn required holding large amounts of milk for an extended period of time. Pasteurization met the needs of the marketplace.

The incidence of food poisoning from cheese is low, especially compared to other protein food products such as meat or eggs. However, all cheese makers know the importance of observing strict hygiene when producing milk or milk products, whether pasteurized or not. The aging process naturally eliminates pathogens in cheese. Most reported outbreaks of disease relating to cheese products are due to contamination from other sources than the cheese-making process, such as handling after the cheeses are made, something that causes problems in raw and pasteurized cheeses alike.

FDA regulations state that raw-milk cheese is an acceptable and safe food as long as it is aged for more than sixty days. However, the FDA is currently considering banning all raw-milk cheese in the United States. If the FDA enacts such a ban, not only would it be impossible for us to eat our locally produced as well as imported raw-milk cheeses, it would encourage the EU to enact a similar ban, a step it is unfortunately considering taking. A few years ago, most traditional European cheeses arrived in our store as raw-milk products. Today, more and more of them are being produced as pasteurized simulacra, greatly impacting their flavor and texture. Cheese producers are either going out of business or adjusting to the new regulations as best they can.

The fact that the existence of traditionally made cheese is threatened is partially due to a misinformed concern that raw-milk cheese is a source of health problems. However, the bigger cause is the globalization of food industries. The pasteurization standards will eliminate many of the small to midlevel cheese factories, particularly the farmstead dairies, leaving the field to the big factories. In the last decade alone, Italy has lost close to half of its native cheeses
forever—
they simply are not being made any longer, and the methods of production have been lost. Soon, when visiting a foreign country you may find the same mass-produced products you see at your local supermarket. A huge loss of variety and flavor, as well as traditional products and ways of life, will be the result.