Cheese of the Week: Hard Chhurpi Cheese

Name: Chhurpi

Brand: None listed

Place of Purchase:

Country of Origin: Nepal

Price in New York: $1.99 for what you see here

Milk: Yak buttermilk

Processing: Cook, add acidic fruit juice, press out whey, squish under rocks, smoke over stone oven.

Texture: rock-solid

Color: Red, beige, tan, all over the map with my pieces alone.

Rind: Natural, basket-weave

Aroma: mild dairy

Taste: Strong, sour dairy

Mouth-feel: Ever lick a brick?

Notes: OK, since I started this adventure I have tried cheeses that I did not prefer.  Some cheeses I would definitely seek out again, while others I would not.  This is the first cheese that I really did not like.  I may have been expecting something sweet.  Maybe something sour?  What I got was a rock that tasted like sour milk.  Now, if I was starving in the Himalayas, I would happily suck on this protein brick until it became soft enough to swallow.  I might hit it with a hammer first, but I'd eat it to survive.  But I wouldn't like it.

Libation of the Week: Fizzy Lizzy Fruit Sodas

Name: Fizzy Lizzy Grapefruit

 

Brand: Fizzy Lizzy

Place of Purchase: Cafe Kubal in Syracuse, NY

Country/Region of Origin: Jersey City, NJ

Tasting Conditions: Chilled in the bottle

Price in New York: $1.99 for 12 oz.

Description: An all natural soda made with 60% fruit juice.

Flavor:  Lip-smacking grapefruit with a perfect fizz.  Not too sweet.

Mouth-feel: The perfect fizz.

Aroma: All grapefruit

Notes:I wish that I could find these drinks in the grocery store.  These all natural sodas come in a variety of flavors (fuji apple, yakima grape, raspberry lemon, and more).  They are made with fruit juices, carbonated water and natural colors.  The 12 ounce bottle comes in at 100-120 calories, which is about 30 to 50 calories less than the leading brand soft drink.  I wouldn't call them completely healthy, but fizzy fruit juice is something I can get behind.

Cheese of the Week: Saint Agur

Name: Saint Agur

Brand: Saint Agur is crafted by the Beauzac cheese dairy in Velay

Place of Purchase: Wegman's in Liverpool, NY

Country of Origin: USA

Price in New York: $20.49/lb.

Milk: Cow with added cream (up to 60% butterfat)

Processing: Double-cream cheese cooked and aged at least 60 days

Texture: soft

Color: bone-white with green veining

Rind: Natural, typically wrapped in foil (mine was sliced)

Aroma: mild dairy, earthy, bleu-notes

Taste: Spikey/sharp bleu notes, but not overpowering.  Cream.

Mouth-feel: Creamy and buttery

Notes: I have an extreme fondness for bleus.  I believe that my severe penicillin allergy gives these cheeses an extra tingle that other eaters might miss.  I suppose bleu cheeses are my fugu.  So be it.  This double-cream bleu is luxurious, with a consistent and creamy paste.  The 60-day aging process gives the cheese a few dairy notes to match the buttery flavors, but this cheese is mostly about the bleu.  The sharp bleu notes are precise and prickly, but not super pungent.  This isn't one of those cheeses that make you stink for the rest of the day.  As spicy as this cheese is, it has a pleasant and delicate aftertaste.

Summer is here and my teaching duties have passed.  Sorry about the extended hiatus, but I just didn't have the time or inclination to post over the past school year.  To anyone who is still reading, I apologize.  Hopefully, I can make it up to you.

Cheese of the week: Creama Kasa

Name: Creama Kasa Cheese

Brand: Carr Valley

Place of Purchase: Wegman's in Liverpool, NY

Country of Origin: USA

Price in New York: $12.79/lb.

Milk: Cow

Processing: Triple-cream cheese sent from Heaven to Wisconsin to Wegmans

Texture: semi-soft

Color: creamy white

Rind: Pretty blue wax

Aroma: mild dairy, brie

Taste: Cream, dairy, wood, brie

Mouth-feel: Creamy and buttery

Notes: Some cheeses shouldn't be legal.  This cheese combines the flavor of a mild ripened cheese, with the buttery velvet of  triple cream.  It must be a holiday special, because when I went back to the store for more, it was all gone.

I miss being close to Wisconsin.

Cheese of the Week: Howe Cavern's Cave-Aged Cheese

Name: Howe Cavern Cave-Aged Cheese

Brand: Howe Caverns &

 

Place of Purchase:  Howe Caverns, NY & Fly Creek, NY

Country of Origin: USA

Price in New York: $15/lb

Milk: Cow

Processing: White cheddar process with cave aging

Texture: Semi-firm, and crumbly

Color: pale-yellow

Rind: Natural waxed (with a nice red wax)

Aroma:wood, musky, like mushrooms

Taste: There is are sharp, cheddar notes in in the front, with airy, fungal/woody notes in the back.

Mouth feel: A nice crumbly cheddar.

Notes: At the end of the day, Howe Caverns Cheese is a gimmick; no different than fresh fudge and screen-printed t-shirts.  However, Howe Caverns Cheese is made from fine, hormone-free, organic, local milk.  It begins as a fine, local, young cheddar and spends some time in the natural caves.  This draws some of the moisture out of the cheese, creating a more crumbly paste than I would expect from a cheddar.  It also adds a number of unique, cave flavors that do not come from an added culture.  A simply and gimmicky as it may be, this cave-aged cheddar is something unique to try after a boat trip through the caves.

Libation of the Week: Calamansi Juice

Name: Calamansi Juice Drink

 

Brand: GINA

Place of Purchase: Asia Market, Rochester, NY

Country/Region of Origin: The Philippines

Tasting Conditions: Chilled in the can

Price in New York: $1.29 for 8.5oz.

Description: A light, tart citrus beverage

Flavor: Somewhere between lime and clementine.  In the actual fruit, the flesh is sour and the rind is sweet, so both are used to make the beverage.

Mouth-feel: Crisp, almost astringent

Aroma: Lots of citrus -- orange blossum, grapefruit, tangerine, even a few champagne notes.

 

Notes: I found this treasure at the Korean market in Rochester, NY.  I was expecting your typical, grapefruit sour juice in a can.  What I got was a unique citrus flavor.  The calamand fruit is a cross between the citrus and some wild bush.  It produces an orange lime with a sweet skin and sour-sour flesh.  The fruit itself is used for juice and beverage preparations, but it is also used to prepare/flavor meats and fish.  The calamind fruit also has anti-microbial properties that can be used for topical skin treatments.  Me, I just thought that the lime-clementine flavor was a refreshing change of pace.

Libation of the Week: Saranac Shirley Temple

Name: Saranac Shirley Temple

 

Brand: Saranac Brewing Company

Place of Purchase: Ontario Orchards in Oswego, NY

Country/Region of Origin: Central NY

Tasting Conditions: Chilled in the bottle

Price in New York: $1.69 for 12 oz.

Description: A spot on bottled version of a standard kiddie cocktail

Flavor:  Syrupy maraschino cherry and fizzy lemon-lime

Mouth-feel: Heavy but not too heavy.  The perfect mix of syrup and fizz.

Aroma: Strong cherry and citrus

Notes: Saranac is a Syracuse-area beer that is a local favorite in the Oswego-area.  I've been to a few mixers since I arrived here, and some kind of Saranac was always available.  Like most breweries in the area, they developed a soft drink line to get them through Prohibition.  The Saranac Shirley Temple was designed during the 1950s to meet the kid's demand for a serious cocktail.  This drink is perfect.  An exact replica of the fresh bar-made drink in the bottle, from taste to mouth feel.  I bought a single bottle and tried it.  Immediately, I bought a 6-pack.  It was that good.

Why no "Roy Rogers" to match?  Because Saranac is world-famous for their Black Cherry and Black Cherry Cream Sodas, instead.