Cheese

I have a problem with cheese.  I think I love it too much.   Its bad because its not just one type of cheese or style I like.  It’s all cheese… real or fake.   I will get just as excited about an Aged Corsican Comte as I will about the liquid gold poured onto my 7-11 Nachos. (Well maybe not equally excited… Corsican cheeses are pretty amazing) 

I love stinky cheeses like Burundian Epoisses or a ripe unpasteurized Munster that should only be transported in open air carriages, least you have to air out your car for a week.  I love manchego with its nutty flavor and richness.  I love the diversity of Ricotta and mascarpone to be used in sweet and savory dishes.  Yet, let’s not forget the ever-faithful blue cheese that will add zip to any salad.  Rogue creamery Smokey blue with sweet red apples was the snack of choice for quite a long time.

With my heart full of adoration for this beautifully blighted lactose, there is one cheese that disappoints me every time. This cheese is a wolf in sheep’s clothing; pretending to be robust and creamy but always ending up bland and barely spreadable.  This sad product is the “baby brie”.  True Brie is the Royalty of spreadable cheese.  When presented in a healthy slice, it cannot contain itself in its skin, but takes possession of cheese plate real estate with its molten properties.  When heated, it oozes with oils that call for your toast to bathe itself in.  Triple cream Brie is so rich it has to be shared with friends and family because you are full after two bites.  On the other hand, Baby Brie is a fraud.  Its convenient tiny wheel is trickery for appetizer spreads everywhere.    It is dressed up in gowns of Filo dough or covered in cranberry sauce, but will never loose its bland yellow center and that edible, but tasteless, white shell.

 “Oh St. Andre, patron stain of fluid cheese, save us from that fuzzy white layer that taste like communion wafers and the commercialization of cheese that should be delicious.”
-The Winocologist