How many types of cheese do you know and love?

[tribdog]

How many different kinds of cheese can you name? How many do you know what they taste like? They've been showing a lot of cheese shows on PBS lately and I've decided I'm definitely unworldly in my cheese knowledge. I'm only familiar with the kinds that come plastic wrapped. If my cheese had a rind on it I wouldn't know whether to throw it out or cut it off or eat it. Are the fancy cheeses better than good ol' cheddar? Is an aged cheese better than string cheese? And do you eat the white powdery looking edge of brie?

 

[tribdog]

Are there Oriental cheeses? There has to be, right?

 

[Astronuc]

Yes - cheeses have a variety of tastes and textures, depending on the ingredients (including additives) and processes (including aging). I had an interesting cheese (Ouray) yesterday in which one could taste the mold (fungus) used to make. The rind had a bit of a moldy or ammonia taste/odor to it.

I also bought a smoked Toussaint cheese, which is very good. I buy specialty cheeses from a local farm, which operates a dairy/creamery. They raise goats and cows, and have some interesting cheeses made from goat and cow milk. Their Sophie goat cheese is great.
http://www.sproutcreekfarm.org/market/MARKETcheese.html

One can eat the white powdery outer surface of Brie, or Camembert.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brie_(cheese )
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camembert_(cheese )


A rather interesting cheese is gjetost, which is Norwegian.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunost


Manchego cheese is also another interesting cheese, which is great for making a cheese sauce for use with asparagus, boccoli, cauliflower, or as an alternative to Parmesan.

 

[Monique]

Can you get good cheese in the US? The only type I could find were the ones that taste and look like plastic. I like anything moldy and stinky or very old: blue stilton, roquefort, gorgonzola, a well aged camembert, or old amsterdam. Goats cheese finds its way into my dinner several times a week.

 

[turbo]

It's possible to find good cheeses in the US, but generally not in a supermarket or grocery store. Here, the best bet is to haunt the farmers' markets. There was a nice cheese and wine specialty shop about 25 miles away from here, years back, but the owner couldn't make a go of it. The store was located in an aging downtown location at a time when the big-box stores were invading and drawing business away from the downtown stores.

 

[Astronuc]

Are there Oriental cheeses? There has to be, right?

Yes, but they are not common and are very regional, e.g.

Yaks say cheese in rural China
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/5281250.stm

Cheese is rarely found in the traditional Chinese diet, except in southern China’s Yunnan Province where local minority groups make an un-aged cheese using water buffalo milk and rice vinegar.

http://english.cri.cn/4026/2008/02/07/191@321271.htm

China imports cheese.
http://www.ap-foodtechnology.com/Industry-drivers/Bright-future-for-Chinese-cheese

Cheese is also seems to be a relatively new phenomenon in Korea.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imsil_County

Cheese.com is a great resource for different types of cheese.
http://www.cheese.com/milk.asp

 

[Moonbear]

The two newest supermarkets in town have nice cheese selections. They aren't in the dairy cases though, that's just where the square bricks of plastic are sold. The good cheese case is nearer to the produce and deli section in both stores. Good cheese is pretty expensive, so I wouldn't want to get a whole lot at once. But, to expand my knowledge of the different cheeses, I used to get a good cheese about once a month, and would pick something different every time. Though, once they did have some very small pieces for sale of some cheddars, so I got a variety of them and compared them side-by-side to find out which I liked best. In the less common types of cheese, they don't often have more than one "brand" at a time to do that. I want to do that with some brie and blue cheeses some time too, since they usually have a larger variety of those available (especially the blue cheeses).

 

[hypatia]

I'm so close to Windsor, so I dash across the boarder and grab some Canadian Black Diamond Cheddar, Black Costello{great blue} and Le Chevre Noir{goat} a few times a year.
I love hard Gouda and Beemster from Holland, and Queso Iberico from Mexico.

 

[Evo]

I love all of the blue cheeses. I am addicted to feta also.

 

[wolram]

Parmesan is my all time favorite, followed by Stilton and then mature Cheddar, and then i love trying the specialist cheeses, some smoked cheeses are great too.
Then there are the soft cheeses with herbs great for spreading on crackers.

 

[turbo]

On my pizzas, I like a blend of mozzarella and provolone, dusted on top with some grated Romano.

 

[Astronuc]

I love all of the bleu cheeses. I am addicted to feta also.

You would probably enjoy Sirene, which is a white cheese from the Balkans.

 

[Moonbear]

I'm so close to Windsor, so I dash across the boarder and grab some Canadian Black Diamond Cheddar, Black Costello{great blue} and Le Chevre Noir{goat} a few times a year.
I love hard Gouda and Beemster from Holland, and Queso Iberico from Mexico.

The Canadian Black Diamond Cheddar is available in the grocery store here. Very tasty. Milder than I'd want on a sandwich, but good with crackers or just for nibbling. I haven't thoroughly explored the blue cheese section, and I avoid goat cheeses (they ALL have a nasty goat-y aftertaste that I can't stand), so don't know if we have those brands here.

There's also a cheddar from Ireland sold here that I like. And, a really interesting one was a three-layered cheddar, I think that was also from Ireland...two layers of yellow and one of white, but all three layers were a different cheddar. Really good all together, or I would nibble out a layer at a time.

 

[binzing]

I have to say I am limited in my knowledge.

So far my favorite is Edam, but that may be due to the fact that we were eating this on a Boy Scout river trip, so I was really hungry.

 

[tribdog]

I saw a movie once where a guy made a grilled cheese sandwich for his girlfriend and he made it out of Jarlsburg. I don't remember the movie, but I remembered that for some reason. The other day I spent 8 bucks for a TINY piece of jarlsburg and made a grilled cheese sandwich. It was okay, but it didn't blow me away. It wasn't even the best grilled cheese sandwich I've ever had.

 

[wolram]

I mix my cheese for grilling with mustard powder and brown sauce, HP , MMMmm.

 

[lisab]

Goats cheese finds its way into my dinner several times a week.

...if it gets there under its own power, I might think twice about eating it...

But then again I love goat cheese. I just might eat it anyway.