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Review Thu May 03 2007
On Goat Cheese and Grunge Rock
If cheese was a hip commodity of the youth culture, like, say, rock and roll, Northern California’s Cypress Grove Chevre would be the Sub Pop Records of the genre. (Just follow me here.)
Adapting and growing since its conception in 1983, the secluded dairy farm first caught on with aficionados and industry types who were taken with the quality and flavors of their offerings in, what was at the time, a sparsely populated goat cheese market. As America’s taste for goat cheese exploded through the 1990’s, Cypress Grove’s reputation for providing fresh, innovative and downright tasty goat cheeses grew. These days, as goat cheese has become less of a novelty and more a regular item on our shopping lists, the dairy has become legendary for maintaining the high quality of their signature cheeses and for the constant innovation and experimentation with new creations. (See a dim parallel with the Seattle record label there?)
(Continued below the flip.)
Cypress Grove’s most acclaimed cheese, Humboldt Fog, is a delicious young goat’s milk cheese that’s visually distinguished by a thin line of vegtable ash running through the middle of its otherwise undisturbed delicate white body. From the thin, thoroughly edible rind to the taut, moist center, the taste is clean and creamy. Some say they can taste a hint of lemon in there, but I say it’s pure springtime—grass and flowers. Wine pairing advice says stick with sweet or crisp whites, which is fine, though, for me it’s also worked with a mild red, an Irish ale and even some half-flat Coke. Go figure.
Humboldt Fog can be found for between $19.95 and $25.75 per pound, along with other Cypress Grove cheeses, around Chicago at vendors like The Cheese Stands Alone, Pastoral Artisan and Whole Foods.
(Ok, so the rock and roll metaphor was lame. Perhaps even a little, uh, cheesy?)
Sarah Sutherland / May 3, 2007 6:09 PM
Oh man. Now I'm craving my own fave, Purple Haze. Yum yum!