The Quest for Curd

As this is my first blog, and I haven't got a clue how these things start, I guess the story of how I got to this point is the best place to begin.

To begin with, let me say that I love cheese. I mean I REALLY LOVE cheese. Growing up, dinner wasn't complete without something made from some kind of milk product. The problem is, I really didn't know what cheese really was until a couple of years ago. You see, I had become tired of the same old counter top offerings of lactose. For me, real cheese never meant more than the standard Cabot sharp, or on some more daring occasions, a generic blue. There were very few options. Either I abandon my love of curd, or I find something to rekindle that childhood passion. The quest began.

Believe it or not, I almost owe my "cultural" growth to a comedy sketch called "Cheese Shop" by Monty Python. Maybe you've seen it. That whole sketch was a little like a metaphor for my love of cheese and my lack of understanding as to what cheese actually is. In the Sketch, a customer walks into a cheese shop and begins to request several cheeses from the monger behind the counter. In every case, the Monger replies to the gist that he doesn't have it or has run out of each one. By the end, the realization is that there is no cheese available to be sold in this particular boutique. The difference with me is that I had never heard of any of the cheeses that were mentioned, but I knew that would be the perfect place to start. The similarity is that once I started asking for them, none of them were available in my normal locales. I knew I had to find new places to locate that which I sought.

I started searching the interwebs with skeptical expectations of finding places that sold my comic list of cheeses. I mean, after all, if you can't find these things at your local supermarket, who else would carry them, right? Yeah, after some searching, I realized just how clueless about the culture of culture I was. My first break happened when, on a recommendation, I stop for something (not cheese related) at a nearby Whole Foods market. I noticed they had a very well stocked cheese counter, and low and behold, I found a wensleydale! I was so happy to have found one of the cheeses on my list that I almost forgot to get what I had come there for in the first place. My journey had begun.

I made several trips to the same Whole Foods, each time grabbing a new cheese, some were not even on my list, and each time I went, I noticed this little room with huge cheese wheels along the back wall. At first I paid it no mind expecting that it was just the room for cutting and packaging the cheese that was sold at the counter. Boy was I wrong. Happily wrong. On a whim, I decided to talk to the young lady working in the room, and she explained that the little cubby of curds was actually filled with exceptional artisanal offering that are cut, packaged and sold to order. I was in heaven. I knew I had arrived.  ..sort of.

Don't get me wrong, pricing aside, Whole Foods was a great first step for me, and I would recommend them to anyone getting started on their own search for amazing fromage. The problem I eventually ran into was the turnaround on the mongers that worked there. I love making friends, but I'd also like to keep the ones I've made, and it made it difficult to build a rapport with your local purveyor of cheese if they constantly disappear. It was recommended in several sources during my online search that one should build a relationship with his or her favored cheese monger. I had cut my teeth at this point and, at least in my own mind, I had earned some chops on the subject of real cheese, so I began to explore other options.

So, in an attempt to stem the flood of thoughts on the subject, on the urging of my lovely wife, I have gotten off my butt and started this little blog to share my experiences as I delve deeper into a subject both dear to my heart and my taste buds. (more on the subject of spouses and cheese in a future post.)

So, if you're interested in cheese and want to know a little more, stay tuned as I sample and review the byproduct of an ancient and highly artistic trade that is rich in both passion and culture. (pun intended)