You don’t see sheep cheese from the Netherlands every day, so I leaped on this one as soon I learned of it. The Dutch make mountains of cow’s milk cheese—about 2 billion pounds a year—but not much else. Goat cheese amounts to less than three percent of the country’s production and sheep cheese is barely a blip. But maybe that’s changing. Ewephoria, a sheep Gouda crafted for the American market about 20 years ago, found an instant fan club (not surprising—it’s like cheese candy), and this newcomer deserves a warm welcome, too. Made with organic milk and matured for six to eight months in the Treur Kaas cellar, this Gouda-like beauty—christened Beppie—is as creamy as a caramel.
Read moreNext-Gen Gouda
A Dutch gentleman in the cheese business once told me that the reason his country’s cheesemakers put so many different spices in Gouda—cumin, caraway, fenugreek, mustard seed—was because the Dutch eat Gouda every day. You have to change it up or lunch gets boring. Goat Gouda, which didn’t gain traction in the Netherlands until the 1980s, provides some variety in the modern Dutch diet. But sheep Gouda? “I am aware of no exported cheeses from the Netherlands made of sheep’s milk, nor, to my knowledge, is there any dairying of sheep there at all,” wrote Steve Jenkins in his authoritative Cheese Primer twenty-five years ago. Time to strike that, Steve. A new Dutch sheep Gouda has landed and it’s on the march.
Read moreHow Old is Too Old?
When does quality peak in a cheese destined for long aging? I’ve had 10-year-old Cheddar (awesome), 4-year-old Parmigiano Reggiano (underwhelming) and a cheese that spent 7 years in a can. (More on that soon.) More recently, I had the opportunity to taste Gouda at four different ages, an enlightening example of what can happen to this iconic Dutch cheese over time. Online merchant igourmet is now carrying these extra-aged wheels so you can duplicate my tasting at home. I’ve served the four cheeses, side by side, to several people now and have been surprised by the reactions, including my own.
Read moreBest Buys at the Cheese Counter
My recent class on “Best Buys at the Cheese Counter” reminded me—and my students—that a superb dinner-party cheese platter doesn’t have to set you back more than the lamb chops. You can spend $35 to $40 a pound on cheese today, or you can spend half that if you know where the values are. I assembled the seven selections for this class without shopping at a big-box store or chain. I was a little surprised by the class favorite but almost all the cheeses got some votes.
Read moreBetter Than Candy
Halloween is pretty quiet at my house. We have almost no kids in our neighborhood. Still, I fill a bowl with candy and wait for the doorbell to ring. This year, I plan to settle in for the evening with my favorite candy—a well-aged, crystalline, caramelly Gouda—and a Rogue Dead Guy Ale. The creepy label will get me in the mood for whatever little ghouls do come to the door.
Read moreDutch Treat
Even dinner guests who tell me they detest goat cheese tend to devour the goat Gouda I serve. “This is goat cheese??” they’ll say, astonished by how sweet, silky and mellow it is. Yay! Another convert. How can you not love a cheese that tastes like it’s halfway down the path to candy? A fine goat Gouda like Brabander deserves to be loved by everybody, not just people with cow’s-milk allergies. Dutch rock-star retailer Betty Koster oversees the long aging, so no wonder it’s fabulous. Grab your cheese plane and a jar of fig jam and get to know one of The Netherlands’ tastiest exports.
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