Cheese Admiration and Celebration

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  • Sinisterbarbie1
    Sinisterbarbie1 Posts: 712 Member
    For those who celebrate Christmas - a little late, but appropriate for this group - cheese advent calendars! https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/holidays/gift-ideas/g29439136/cheese-advent-calendars/
    The japanese tea i mentioned having this morning in the above post was from a green tea advent calendar my sister sent me so I thought if they make advent calendars for esoteric things like green tea, there must be one or two for cheese as well!
  • joans1976
    joans1976 Posts: 2,201 Member
    @Sinisterbarbie1 I went to Aldi the day the advent calendars came out as I am a big Aldi fan and know what a big deal these calendars are. I got there right when they opened. Alas, no cheese advent calendars were delivered to that store 😔 so I just picked up my favorite Aldi holiday cheese, cranberry white cheddar. I got a chocolate truffle advent calendar and a treat one for my cat. There’s always next year!
  • runmomof2wi
    runmomof2wi Posts: 1 Member
    Fun thread!

    A year ago, I started a new job at a cheese packing company. We take big formats of cheese (big blocks, slabs, wheels) and cut, grate, shred, crumble, or mix them into their final intended format.

    A few interesting things I've noticed/learned...the same style cheese can taste wildly different from cheesemaker to cheesemaker. I will not eat feta from one, but love the feta from another. Same with blue. I enjoy blue cheese, but my favorite is a company that imports the wheels from Denmark. Also, the different brands you see in the store often use cheese from the same cheesemaker. You're paying for the brand name.

    Locally, I've been loving Red Rock from Roelli.
    https://www.roellicheese.com/cheese-shop/red-rock-cheese/
  • Sinisterbarbie1
    Sinisterbarbie1 Posts: 712 Member
    edited December 2022
    Ok so what I am about to share is not cheese, so forgive me, but I found it in the cheese display and it is weird and brown and sweet like gjetost so i figured there might be some sort of cheese adjacent loophole bc technically gjetost is not cheese either. But this really isn’t cheese, I just think it would go well on a dessert cheese board with fruit. … Dark chocolate hummus. I thought it sounded gross at first too, but then I looked at the ingredients and it is just steamed chick peas and dark cocoa and honey and OMG I am having it for breakfast with some apples and fiber biscuits and at 80 calories for 28g it is delicious and just the right amount of decadent, Not overly sweet, and not tacky and sticky, Better than chocolate? Maybe like a less sweet chickpea based nutella? Ok back to the regular cheese programming. It WAS in the cheese case or I would not have mentioned it. The other hummus are elsewhere!
  • acpgee
    acpgee Posts: 7,551 Member
    Spainish pan de higo is a great sweet accompaniment to a cheese board too. Google for simple recipes. Essentially blitz dried fruit and toasted nuts in the food processor, add some brandy then press into a baking paper lined form (I use silicon muffin cups) weight down and refrigerate for a day. Makes a nice homemade hostess gift. Keeps forever in the fridge.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 31,717 Member
    Today, while shopping, this:

    5fg46xdsj15j.jpg

    I'd already bought a small, whole Camembert-style cheese (made to ripen just right for Christmas) from my local farmstead cheesemaker. Today's purchases also included a small piece of mango ginger Stilton.

    Christmas dinner is shaping up to be a series of cheese courses, I guess?

    😆😋
  • mtaratoot
    mtaratoot Posts: 12,930 Member
    @AnnPT77

    Unless their normal price is usury, you just gave yourself a very nice gift. Mmmmm.

    I decided to pick up some more sheep/cow blue cheese. We'll see how long it lasts. When I am at the other store with the sale on Black Label Cambozola... I will get more.

    Enjoy the fog!
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 31,717 Member
    mtaratoot wrote: »
    @AnnPT77

    Unless their normal price is usury, you just gave yourself a very nice gift. Mmmmm.

    I decided to pick up some more sheep/cow blue cheese. We'll see how long it lasts. When I am at the other store with the sale on Black Label Cambozola... I will get more.

    Enjoy the fog!

    Runs around $30-32 USD a pound around here, usually. This was marked $29.99, then they took off the 30% at the register, plus the (trigger warning!) Amazon Prime discount, because this was at Whole Foods. I only bought a small chunk (around a quarter pound), because that's still pricey (and a little calorie dense), but my $7.80 piece went down to $4.91 before tax.

    I'm calling it a win. And I could still go back for a couple of days, buy more, if this piece mysteriously disappears.

    I haven't been able to find any Black Label Cambozola at my local cheese haunts yet, but I'm still looking.

    WF has some nice blue cheeses on sale now (at regular sale prices), too, including the Saint Agur that's one I really like. The "12 days" 30% off also included some other tempting cheeses, I don't remember all the details but one was a nice long-aged gouda. I need to rein myself in a little bit, sometimes. And there's already that nice local camembert-ish cheese and the mango ginger stilton, plus the other cheeses in my cheese drawer . . . .

    If anyone has a close-by Whole Foods, might want to see if this special is system-wide. There were some goodies.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 31,717 Member
    lmg5nib5mg4s.jpeg
    Saw this and thought it was perfect for this thread!

    🤣🤣🤣

    That's perfect: Guilty as charged! 🤣
  • Wynterbourne
    Wynterbourne Posts: 2,196 Member
    The husband and I pulled out the Raclette Mini Grill again for the New Year. We've decided to make it our regular New Year's thing. One year we hope to actually have it in Switzerland. Granted, that may be a bad idea, as I doubt our home version will ever be as good again. LOL.
  • sarakenna12
    sarakenna12 Posts: 37 Member
    Oh, what a thread! I live in Oregon, and we have some of the most wonderful blue cheese in the world! Rogue Valley Creamery is particularly famous but there are many other Oregon Blues that are wonderful too. We are also known for our cheddars. Some of my favorites right now is an aged Tillamook white cheddar from 2019 (or 2017 or 2018 but those are harder to find) that have those little crystals that form with age. There's also one called Two-Face that's a mixed milk cheddar with cow and goats milk made by Rock Face Creamery. That one is so lovely. I also really really really love a mushroomy french double cream. It makes me so sad that we aren't allowed to import unpasturized cheese in the US. I need to travel to Europe to really satisfy my cheese pallet.
  • mtaratoot
    mtaratoot Posts: 12,930 Member
    @sarakenna12

    Don't forget Rogue Creamery and their Oregonzola!
  • springlering62
    springlering62 Posts: 7,334 Member
    The husband and I pulled out the Raclette Mini Grill again for the New Year. We've decided to make it our regular New Year's thing. One year we hope to actually have it in Switzerland. Granted, that may be a bad idea, as I doubt our home version will ever be as good again. LOL.

    Our daughter gave us one of these for Christmas several years ago, explaining it was a German tradition. We asked her how to use it, and she stared blankly at us and said “I don’t know. I’ve never seen anyone use one”.

    So we’ve got one we lugged (because the surfaces are freaking granite) all the way home, and have no clue how to use it. Need to order a power adaptor for it, too. *sigh*. The weird things that live in your utility room.

    How are you using yours?