Cheese, wonderful cheese

The first installment of the Zingermans Cheese Club subscription I got Snark for his birthday arrived today! It was quite an event. The box arrived by FedEx, filled with an ice pack, a large loaf of their farm bread, the three cheeses, and a whole lot of information about not only those cheeses, but Spanish cheese in general and a number of other Spanish cheeses in particular.

Naturally, for dinner we had just the bread and cheese, plus a salad and a bottle of wine. Here are my impressions of the cheese:

Mahón: This was Snark's favorite. It has a soft, dusky orange rind and a deep cream colored, creamy center. It is a "hard cheese," like all the cheeses in our package, but about as soft as a hard cheese can get; at warm room temperature, we could easily spread it on our bread. It has a rich, ripe flavor, with a surprising little flash of blue at the finish. I normally hate blue cheese, so this was just at the edge of what I could eat and still enjoy. According to the Zingermans notes, what we have is a farmhouse version of the cheese, but it is very difficult to find Mahóns that aren't factory-made. That's okay with me -- it was good, but not really to my taste.

Manchego: The one cheese of the three that I was already familiar with, in an extra-good iteration of itself. It smells much stronger than it is -- positively footish -- but was between the other two in strength/mildness. Delicious eaten in thin or thick slices, and also good in a little sandwich of bread, olive oil, vinegar, red leaf lettuce, and raw yellow peppers. A straightforward, yummy sheep's milk cheese.

Zamorano: My favorite. It's made with raw sheep's milk, and though it's milder than I expected to go for, it's not at all bland. The mildness is about gentleness, not lack of flavor; it is fruity and tangy, just very smooth. It has a terrific texture, both creamy and firm, perfect to eat in thin slices (or more as one gets greedier). It would be great in a salad with ripe tomatoes, or even, I think, used in cooking. I might try it with the tagliatelle with caramelized onions, which is meant to incorporate some sort of sheep's milk cheese. I'd been using Romano, but I'm imagining that the Zamorano would bridge the tanginess of the yogurt with the sweetness of the onions in a really spectacular way. Yum.

Posted by redfox at June 27, 2002 10:24 PM (dinner reports)

all breads | breakfast | dinner reports | drink | eating out | essays | etcetera | lunch | news | recipes | salads | snacks | soups | sweets | tips | travel | vegetables | weekly meals |