Cash Rules Everything Around Me

Cheese is a business. So just like in any business, you'll find your everyday moron. Even in the cheese world -- a world I've described as home to some of the warmest people I've ever met -- there is a smattering of undesirable personalities.

Once I found myself trapped in a conversation with an otherwise well-intentioned cheese guy/business guy who was suffering from a severe affliction of self-involved verbal diarrhea and smarminess. Not only was he unable to stop talking about how awesome he was --the words "I'm a hustler" actually came out of his middle-aged suburban mouth--, but he also thought so highly of his sense of judgment that he took it upon himself to psychoanalyze me on our first meeting. To him, the cheese counter was a stage, and he proceeded to question whether I really had the stage presence for "cheese theater" if I were to open a potential store of my own.

It was completely idiotic. I felt dumber for having participated in the conversation. Cheese store guests should feel like a cheesemonger is their friend and cohort in an adventurous hunt for a delicious food experience. Customers shouldn't be treated like a detached audience while their cheesemonger makes a fool of himself by over-dramatizing the relationship. And while some people (me) can't get enough of cheese or may joke about running a black market raw milk cheese trade, I sure as all get-out don't want my cheesemonger to hustle the stuff on me like a dime-bag of dairy goodness. Having now spent many successful weeks behind the cheese counter, I see how full of crap that guy was.

Pretty much everything that came out of his mouth exuded the two character traits that have cast the artisanal cheese industry (foreign and domestic) in a pretentious and elitist light:  narcissism and vanity. When people vomit that kind of nonsense, it makes customers think the reason they're paying $30/lb for cheese is because someone with a big vocabulary and fancy attitude wants to make a buck on spoiled milk. They don't see the hard work the farmers and cheesemakers put in to develop the recipes, care for the animals and make the product, or the effort the cheesemongers should be making to help them discover something new and delicious. They just see a buffoon, a court jester, a dairy thug, trying to sleaze their way to some dollar-dollar bills.

On both sides of the counter -- among cheesemongers and customers alike, people who think they're members of some cool kids club because they know a thing or two about cheese make it really difficult for the other person to enjoy the experience and the exploration.

There are self-involved, sleazy types everywhere. Having seen plenty of that in the corporate world, a fear of turning into a cheese counter cretin has hindered my own self-promotion in the cheese world. Many dear friends and supporters have encouraged me to do more to "brand" myself, if you will. Post more on the blog, review products, teach classes, link to my posts on Facebook, give Cheesy Street information out to strangers and new contacts, advertise. Instead, I have yet to burn through a 100-count deck of business cards I printed for myself, and a lot of acquaintances and old friends still have no idea what I'm doing with my life. Telling new people what I do usually begins with a hesitant stutter that I use to fill the space I anticipate from the awkward silence that will ensue.

Let's be blunt, though, every business needs a palatable amount of hustle to keep enough green paper flowing through its veins to stay alive. I realize that talking about what I do with people is essential to long-term survival, and, really, not so terrible. I handed out a very rough first draft of my business card to former classmates at my 10-year high-school reunion -- the epitome of awkward situations. I even unloaded a card to a stranger on the Subway a few weeks ago -- a native Brooklynite who spent some time in Wichita and struck up a conversation with me about my Kansas t-shirt. His wife loves cheese, I'm told. I'll probably never see or hear from that guy or his wife, but at least my card and web address are floating out there somewhere.

Talking about my cheese life has gotten much easier, and led to some really great conversations. Even strangers can sense your character pretty easily when you start talking about yourself. I've learned that as long as you are genuine and enthusiastic, people are really interested in hearing about your craft - be it accounting, lawyering, painting, cheesemongering, what-have-you. Everyone wants to talk to real people, not hustlers, clowns, or showmen. As long as you keep the smarm out of it, business-talk ain't so bad.

This is also a long way of self-promoting two things: 1) So you might have picked up that I have a first draft on a business card. It's really DIY and needs a lot of changes, upgrades and updates. But it looks like:

Biz cards with pictures from the blog and info on the back.

I look forward to dropping it in fish bowls for drawings at various restaurants and hotels.

2) Cheesy Street is blowin up homies!! Soon....well as soon as I figure out how the hell to design a web page...it'll be moving to its very own Dot Com! Without the hyphen! The Cheesy Street url was something I tried to reserve over a year ago when Tad and I came up with the name. Unfortunately I wasn't aware of Internet trolls who poach urls and purchase them shortly after someone runs a search for the name on services like GoDaddy, with the hope of selling or auctioning the domain at a higher price to those who really want it. The day after I searched for cheesystreet.com and was ready to to buy it, I realized some fool in Utah had bought it from under me hours earlier. Eventually he realized there was no burning demand for cheesystreet.com and transferred it to my friend Chris who will be helping me figure out how to design the page...which will happen ...someday...in the future...Okay so I have no idea when it will happen, but at least the option is there now and it WILL happen. 

Steady Chasin that Cheese Curd

Adios Hwy 90. It's been real. 

I’ve come a long way from the naive cheese traveler wandering into Del Rio, half-panicked by my own preconceived notions and by all the border-town fear mongers regurgitating what they heard on the news or read in the travel section of Reader’s Digest. I remember driving the stretch of Highway 90 that dips within two miles of the Rio Grande at dusk, nervously expecting gangs of drug mules, cartel henchmen, and human-traffickers to be leaping across the road like legions of West Texas deer.  

That was 7 months ago. I’ve learned a lot since then.

Still, some things don’t change. My belongings remain mostly stored in boxes and I continue to use suitcases as bedroom furniture. As I put Del Rio behind me in my trusty CR-V, the radio couldn't have selected a more apt farewell serenade: Whitesnake’s “Here I Go Again on My Own."

Because, indeed, like a drifter I was born to walk alone. And this particular lonely street of dreams has led me from the Texas-Mexico border to New York City. The unlikeliest of transitions. 

NYC -- the cradle of big dreams. Some people come for fame. Some for fortune. Some in search of love, purpose, or identity. I came here for a modest wage, relative obscurity, and dairy products.

It was the next logical and exciting step in my cheese schooling. I’ve worked with great cheesemakers. So, it was about time I finally found a great cheese retail opportunity. I told you about my failed retail search when I first arrived in Texas last Fall. Nevertheless, I found a great cheesemaking fit in BVC and used my own kitchen as a platform for productivity with home cheesemaking. 

  

I had to tap some serious ingenuity to make a cheese life for myself in the desolate West Texas desert. It took some mileage to Waco and and several cheesemaking fails in my kitchen, but I did it.

Of course, it was unsustainable. I couldn’t continue the 11-hour weekly commute for much longer. And the grocery store cashiers started to get curious about my frequent milk purchases, giving me suspicious looks as if I had developed some new way to cook up meth or Molotov cocktails with dairy.  

It was time to move on even though it would require another solo adventure. Tad would wrap things up in Del Rio over the course of the year, keeping dutiful guard over the meticulously labeled boxes I have stored in his closet.

Meanwhile as I strategized my next move, the previous year's journey came full circle. Last Fall, I arrived in Del Rio en route from my internship in Washington State with Black Sheep Creamery -- an internship that not only taught me a lot about cheesemaking and farmers markets, but also gave me the gift of an opportunity that once made my skin crawl in professional circles: networking. Through Meg and Brad, I connected with several local cheesemongers and cheese retailers, including a Seattle-based cheese institution, Beecher’s Handmade Cheese. Beecher’s incidentally was boldly entering the East Coast cheese field by opening a second branch in New York City. Even then it seemed like an exciting opportunity with a great company that is as passionate about good food as I am. Before happenstance led Tad and I to Del Rio for a temporary period, I assumed I was heading back to the East Coast after my cheese internships ended, so I expressed interest in getting involved with the new branch. Then, adventures in a border town came calling. 

Fortunately fate, good timing, and “networking” with the people I had met at Beecher’s would nevertheless allow me to grow my cheese ambitions with them. The opening of the new store had been pushed to mid 2011, at just the moment when I was ready for the next step.  And, thankfully, my year of cheese learning cast a sheen of marginal competence on me, and they took me on to the opening team. So, now I'm back on the East Coast, helping put the gears in motion for a major NYC cheese store opening. A bonafide cheesemonger in the big city. I wanted to know how deep the Swiss cheese hole goes and there’s no turning back. This is it. This is what I do. Cheesemaker. Cheesemonger. Cheese stalker – I’ve followed it everywhere; my CR-V can attest.

There are such things as proprietary secrets and non disclosure agreements I vaguely recall from law school that are usually involved with successful companies, even cheesy ones. So while there may not be much in the way of daily details anymore, don't worry. Every chapter of this cheese story seems to have developed its own voice based on the circumstance. I think we’ve grown past the details and the baby steps together. There will be discoveries to share in this chapter, just like the others. 

As I leave the last stage of the adventure, Whitesnake resonating truth through my speakers, I know one thing. If we can find cheesy happiness for the better part of a year in desolate West Texas, we can find it anywhere. 

Cheese and Youth: A Sociologically Sound Guarantee of Excellence in Life

Last week at my Waco gig with Brazos Valley, I learned two things about children. One, if they are open to the idea of experimenting with cheese, then teaching them cheesemaking is a surprisingly productive and fun educational exercise. And, two, children know way too much about the use and effect of ADHD drugs amongst their classmates, and what happens when little Johnny Q forgets to take his pills. This blog is about cheese and not Adderall, so we'll leave the latter to a clever anecdote about the darndest things kids say.

I've mentioned that the good folks at BVC host an array of classes on homesteading crafts like woodwork, blacksmithing, pottery, and, of course, cheesemaking. The cheesemaking classes come in varying level of difficulty and give hands-on instruction on everything from the production to the aging. Usually, adults take the cheese classes. Every once in a while, a visiting school on a field trip will be adventurous enough to test the potentially volatile combination of grade schoolers and hands-on cheesemaking. Last week, I popped in to observe a children's cheesemaking class.

Nothing warms my heart more than a child who is daring with cheese. Most children love the cheeses familiar to mac & cheese or grilled cheeses -- the bright orange and safer versions of dairy-lust. I'm particularly awed, however, by the children who build on their conventional, youthful cheese love by dabbling in cheeses off the beaten path for a little person with such underexposed taste buds. If I meet a child who tells me they like blue cheese (and surprisingly, I've met a handful), that is a child who I know is quite advanced in being awesome at life -- a child who I look at and think, "you know kid, you're going to be alright."

Children are notoriously picky eaters. You can't really blame them for that. A child's receptiveness to foods is largely linked to both physiology and familiarity. Taste buds usually adapt to familiar and repeated flavors. If a child is not used to a food, the "strangeness," either perceived or real, may scare them away. Taste buds also become less sensitive and less abundant with age. So children prefer milder, sweeter flavors, and shy away from flavors like spices or strong cheeses that blast their sensitive palates. Generally, children become somewhat heartier, adventurous eaters as their taste buds soften, and as their parents begin exposing them to new and "unusual," healthy, fresh foods. The extent to which people open up to different foods is still, of course, based on subjective and cultural preferences. So, yes, picky eating is biological, but it is also linked, in part, to good parenting and ensuring your kid isn't a spoiled spawn who gets whatever bland junk food they want.

Kids' cheese preferences and eating habits are perfectly understandable for both scientific and gastronomical reasons. I love the warming comfort of an orange safety cheese myself (save for Kraft Singles or any brand of American cheese, which I have loathed since childhood for leaving my mouth tasting of a rubber balloon swabbed in someone's hot armpit). It's a safe bet that most people raised in this country love those cheeses just the same, at least secretly. And why not?  Boring, industrially-produced cheeses and cheese product is delightfully salty, incredibly versatile, and cooking with it makes you feel about as happy and youthful inside as sucking down a Fla-Vor-Ice on a hot day.

Fighting for position in the curd

But when kids are willing to try foods that are unfamiliar and often strange, it says something to me about their advanced open-mindedness to a world outside of themselves. To find a child who knows about different foods, who affirmatively likes, say, blue cheese, or who at the very least is willing to try unusual cheeses and foods, is to find a child who's momma raised him right.

The children I saw in last week's cheese class of elementary schoolers exhibited all the fine qualities of good-natured adventurousness with food. They were excited to try feta cheese, a salty and often unusual cheese for kids, and scream out their opinion of it, even if the review wasn't particularly glowing. When mozzarella-making rolled around, they were eager for a chance to dip their hands in the gooey curds and whey. Everyone smelled like cheese at the end and nobody complained. Okay, they might have complained a little, but they still had a grand time overall. I'm not too worried about kids like this; I think they're on track to excel...well, as long as they don't forget to take their pills. 

Tour de Cheesemongers

Recently, I became sane again…mostly. I have a few things to thank for this: My visits with various cheesemongers in the region being one.

ACS was a great experience for learning and meeting new people. Frankly, though, it freaked me out. I mentioned that many of the seminars made the possibility of opening a cheese store seem either emotionally consuming or financially crippling. It was not the intended message of the panelists, who had a lot of other very helpful information to offer. They were just being honest about the difficulties they and many other cheesemongers and business-people face. It was just in my mind that the scary parts were repeating like an echo.

Really, it was due for me. Realism is always needed in small doses, and I was dreaming big with no concept of what the dream would require in reality. But I became a pendulum. Instead of focusing on the helpful tips and bringing my optimism down to a natural and healthy level, I panicked. I was in a small, depressing town, far from everyone I confide in, panicking. I felt like I had eloped with cheese, and was spending our honeymoon in Indiana—or worse yet, Delaware—where cheese had left me in the Motel 6 to run off and blow our life-savings gambling at the horsetrack and getting elaborate drunken tattoos of fire trucks on his face. Me, with nobody to talk to, wondering if I had made the right decision.

Every day I was working at the farm I felt reassured. So much so that I began to think that perhaps I should just switch my vision to making cheese or working with cheesemakers. I was constantly reminded how lucky I am to work with something I love so much. Cheese could never let me down. That is until I went home, where there was very little to do, and began to think about a future cheese shop. My mind went in all sorts of directions until a cheese shop transformed cheese into that drunk, broke, fire-truck-faced idiot that wanted to scavenge on my joy. Oh cheese, how could you?

In reality, it never did, and it wouldn't. Cheese as a tattoo-faced degenerate was just a phantom of my own creation. I realized this first when I visited Sheri’s store, Calf and Kid, in Seattle. Prior to opening her shop, Sheri had spent a few weeks at Black Sheep learning about the finer points of cheese birth. Turns out she keeps a blog for her business and began writing it when she was just getting the store off the ground. I went through her blog last month, and while it seemed that her pace in opening a shop was much more decisive than mine, I found a lot of commonality with her vision. Because of that, Sheri had a lot of useful insight to offer. Most importantly, she had the attitude I had been looking for since ACS: a cheese shop does not have to consume your life, and there are ways you can avoid unnecessary costs to keep it financially reasonable. Sheri was completely open and willing to share details on any stupid question I asked. She let me shadow her in her shop for two whole days! I was incredibly lucky and thankful. She shared a lot of useful tips on saving money, like calling in handy friends to help with build-out instead of relying on useless general contractors. She helped me gain a lot of perspective on what needed to be done to bring to life a cheese shop you love (and don’t resent). Her shop is part of the larger Melrose Market in Seattle, which brings together several food-related businesses (restaurants, meat shop, winebar, sandwiches). It is very similar to the size and set-up I kept coming back to in my head, especially after this summer when I visited Saxelbys in New York’s Essex Market. Starting small seemed like the best option. A smaller shop is welcoming, and it can help keep costs down and keep me sane. What if I can’t find a suitable location like the Melrose Market. Will a big store necessarily make cheese a burden for me? 



Cheese Bar is open until 11pm and

doubles as a friendly,

nighborhood watering hole...

...but the cheese is definitely the star.

Steve, of Cheese Bar in Portland (formerly Steve’s Cheese) put that fear to rest. I shadowed Steve and his staff at the Cheese Bar for one afternoon, getting some extensive wrapping practice, watching customer interactions, and asking questions. Steve started off small, just a cheese counter in a wine store, and recently expanded into a stand-alone storefront with food, cheese plates, beer and wine to accompany the fully-stocked cheese counter. True, Steve began small, on the scale of stores such as Calf and Kid or Saxelbys. Still, expanding into an exponentially bigger space requires a significant investment. Through a lot of do-it-yourself labor and thoughtful planning, he managed to accomplish the expansion without the crippling debt numbers they were talking about at ACS. Both Sheri and Steve, calmed my fears, helped me see where to begin on the business front, and, through their laid-back approach, gave me hope. Granted, I can’t build a counter or pull up floors on my own, but I do have some handy friends. Eh eh? Handy friends, I’m looking at you; there’s free cheese in this for you.  



My last stop was DeLaurenti’s at Pike’s Place market, which isn’t so much a cheese shop as it is an institution. DeLaurenti’s cheese counter is insane. Their meat counter is equally awe-inspiring. Forget Murray’s, this is like the Sisteen Chapel of cheese. There’s just so much to take in. The store has been running in the market since the 1940s and is a full-fledged wine shop and specialty store as well. Obviously my initial ambitions are not to emulate DeLaurenti’s on scale. That would just be stupid…and require me to have very rich parents. I shadowed the cheesemongers at DeLaurenti’s for a few hours mostly to see how they interact with their customers. A cheese shop of that magnitude and in such a high-profile location can become very intimidating for shy cheese enthusiasts. When I first visited the shop, I noticed how welcoming it felt, as well as the exceptionally personal and patient interaction the cheesemongers had with their customers. I was equally impressed that many of them could tell all the cheeses apart without their labels. Seriously, though, 200 cheeses! My afternoon at DeLaurenti’s reminded me of the interactions that made me want to open a store to begin with.

So all that was a long way of saying, I feel much better now. Also, I’m just stupid lucky to have gotten a chance to hang out at all these stores for several hours at a time – always in the way and full of questions. I was supremely appreciative that so many helpful cheesemongers were willing to open their business to me in that way. That means two things. One, cheese folks in the Northwest have an amazing, supportive relationship with each other. Two, people really think highly, as they should, of Meg and Brad to be welcome someone who they hear is affiliated with Black Sheep.

Finally, I also feel a sense of calm because I’m starting to form a rough plan for my life after I leave here in the next few days. I know I still have a lot to figure out and learn about cheese and business. But I hadn’t really thought much past November. I didn’t even know where Tad and I would be living. To a certain extent, I still don’t know the full picture. At least I’ve written down some options on a notepad and bought a used book on opening a small business. That’s a start.

Harvest Dinner

Sunday was the annual Chehalis harvest dinner to celebrate the end of market season. There are two more farmers markets left in Chehalis and the weather has treated us kindly as of late. While end of season tends to bring a halt to customer traffic and sales dramatically, I'm always impressed by the relationship the community has with its market and its vendors. Now I'm doubly impressed with the community after the harvest dinner, which had better food and decorations than a lot of weddings I've attended.

Every ingredient in the meal came from one of the market vendors. It was all cooked and catered by one of the local chefs who has a prepared food stand at the market. Fresh produce and meat is delicious in its own right. But this guy works some sort of magic that makes it even more delicious. I don't think I've stuffed my face that hard since I've been out here. At first I was a little apprehensive when I heard the lamb for the lamb moussaka came from Black Sheep Creamery (frozen and stored away after lambing season in the spring). I wasn't around to meet any of the lambs when they were born, but I know their mothers. I've wrestled medicine into their mothers' mouths. I've watched their mothers conceive some of their future siblings. It seemed wrong. But whatever, I'm an omnivore and who am I to say no to delicious food? It was already cooked, so better not let their lives perish in vain. The food was amazing. The local ensemble band of school kids playing celtic music was surprisingly awesome. There was a slideshow with pictures from the farms of all the local vendors. But the best part was the support of the community. There were over 100 people at this dinner, and I can tell you there are definitely not that many vendors. People from the town, including business owners and local officials, had purchased tickets to come enjoy an evening with their favorite food purveyors.

It was a great night of community charm and hardcore eating.

The American Cheese Society Conference: Tummy Aches and Big Timers

The annual ACS Conference and Competition is the big show for cheese. This year it was held in Seattle and I made it out to the west coast just in time to attend. I'm new to the professional cheese world, so I feared one of two things: 1) it would either be like the Star Trek convention of cheese where the overall enthusiasm for cheese would surpass even mine and send me running from my cheese connection for fear of becoming a social outcast; or 2) it would be like a legal conference--stilted, awkward, boring, and lots of conversations where I struggle to be knowledgeable. 

It was neither. 

One of the evening receptions,
with a DJ and dance floor
like it was cheese prom

I'll start by answering the first question most of you might have. Yes, there was a LOT of cheese to eat at the conference. There was cheese at lunch, cheese at breakfast, cheese at breaks between sessions, cheese in the bookstore, cheese at the evening receptions, cheese in sessions on tastings and parings. I was mildly surprised there wasn't cheese in the bathroom to eat after peeing. There was an insufferable amount of cheese. I'm not one to complain about constant access to cheese, especially at the price you pay to attend the conference. But, my major concern was waste. There is no way all of that cheese was eaten. In fact, by the end of the conference, most people I talked to were so over cheese. They couldn't eat anymore. So what happened to all that leftover cheese? I can only hope a food bank or food kitchen benefited from our cheesy lavishness. 

Not only was the cheese plentiful, but the food was too. If you can't tell from my constant fatty-fatass discussions of food (see almost every road trip post), cheese people really like good food. Some of the meals were generic hotel food; but overall the evening receptions and lunches had a lot of really good food. I went home with a tummy ache most nights. 

The sessions I signed up for where mostly aimed at retailers and those considering opening a retail cheese business. After the first day I was really amped up for all the information I was absorbing and all the great people I was meeting. The second day, I crashed a bit and here's why. All three of my classes on day 2 were retail oriented. The lesson I was absorbing = this is going to cost you a lot more than you anticipate, you will be in debt for the rest of your life, it will be a decade before you get a return on your capital investment and become profitable, and your life will be owned by this store.  It sounded like law school all over again. 

Maybe, I panicked a little. The few cheese store owners I had talked to previously had started out modestly and with manageable investments. Now I was meeting many fellow aspiring retailers, much farther ahead in their business planning than me, who were talking six figures in start-up costs. That might be easier for many people to stomach who don't already have six figures in student loan debt. It made me want to throw up. I was additionally freaked out when I heard that only one of the people on a 4-person panel of successful retail shop owners had paid back their initial capital investment loan...and she did it because she had no staff. A shop owner in Norman, Oklahoma advised me to budget almost a quarter million in start-up costs. And she's in Norman! Oklahoma! What the hell am I going to do in a place like DC? 

Oh hai, I'm 30-years-old, and all I have to my name is nearly half a million in debt, several hundred pounds of cheese, and a Nintendo-64 equipped with Mario Kart and GoldenEye. Awesome. 

I guess the good news is that everyone loved their job. After calming myself down a little and talking it out with my new aspiring-retailer friends, I realized I might just need to re-evaluate the size and aspirations of Cheesy Street, at least at start-up. It can be done for less. Though circumstance, luck, customer base and market often dictate the size. I guess I'll just have to tackle the money problem when it arrives. 

Cheese and beer tasting. Yes, please.

Despite my suddenly burst bubble, I was heartened by a few things. First, Cheesy Street store or not, I'm completely convinced that I jumped into the right world. There could be a lot more for me in cheese than I had imagined. I know I love making cheese now. Plus, there are plenty of really important lobbying issues for Raw Milk dairy producers where my law degree might actually have some use. I love writing about cheese and food. I've even become somewhat better at tasting and pairing (just barely). No matter what happens (either in addition to or instead of a shop), there's something in the cheese world that I can get involved with and love. 

Second, cheese people are awesome. Remember my fear about ACS being like a legal conference? It was the exact opposite. People actually were kind, easy to talk to, and supportive. Store-owners want to see each other succeed (assuming you don't open up right next door, that is), and cheese big timers I met were actually interested when words came out of my mouth. One established cheesemaker went out of his way to stop me after lunch and introduce himself, apologizing for not getting a chance to do so when I sat at their lunch table. That would NEVER happen at a legal conference! I met a lot of really great people, most of whom I'm sure I'll have the pleasure of seeing or working with in the future. 

Maybe the only place in the world
where tasting spoon-fulls
of butter is a-okay

The closing keynote speaker was Michael Pollan, author of various musings on food, including The Omnivore's Dilemma. He opened talking about our obsession with food simply as the vehicle for nutrients and went on to discuss his philosophy on eating, eating well, and not too much. (The not too much part seemed ironic considering the mountains of food we were seeing on a daily basis). His speech made a lot of sense. I appreciated his barbs at the "food product" in Kraft American Singles, but not so much when he busted out the can of Easy Cheese.  It's hypocritical, I don't eat it anymore, and I know it sucks. But I'm going to stand behind my Easy Cheese until the day my collegiate nostalgia dies. 

There were over a dozen tables
that looked like this at the Festival

The grand finale was the announcement of winning cheeses and the Festival of Cheese. Every year cheesemakers across North America enter their cheeses into one of about 100 categories in the ACS judging competition. I'm told it's the Academy Award of cheeses. Each year the entries have almost doubled. This year 1435 cheeses entered. And it blows my mind to comprehend, but after the awards are announced, each of those 1435 cheeses are on display for tasting. Thus is born, the Festival of Cheese. I think a good Man vs. Food challenge might be attempting to taste each of the entries. I had never seen so much dairy in one room. I tried about twenty, and mostly stuck to award-winners. By the last day, I finally mastered how to avoid a tummy ache. 

The cheesemongering competition on the first day.
As you can see, on the right, there is even a wrapping component.

The Festival

Both my internship farms won awards!

Meeting the Cheese Family Part 3: Making Goat Cheese at Beltane

Until now, my only experience making cheese has been at Cato Corner and a brief laboratory session at cheese school in Vermont (i.e., VIAC classes). I thought all cheesemaking was an intense, sweat-soaked battle with curd. I completely forgot that not all cheese comes in ten to thirty-pound wheels of bicep challenging fury. What revived my cheesy perspective? Making goat cheese at Beltane Farm for a day.

Paul at Beltane and Mark at Cato Corner are cheese buddies who make their respective cheeses ten minutes down the road from each other. They each have their niche and they each rock the cheesy rind off that niche. Mark is the master of raw cow's milk, whereas Paul makes awesome fresh chevre and bloomy rind, French-style soft-ripened goat cheese from pasteurized goats milk. Last week, Paul was gracious enough to let me see the farm and help them out for a day in the cheeseroom.

Paul had a very calm and patient approach that made working in his cheeseroom a pleasure. His staff was great to work with as well. The majority of the time we laughed and talked about cartoons and music, so I felt right at home.

I started out, as expected, with cleaning dishes. Cleaning is always a constant no matter what cheesemaker you're working with. Then, I took down the chevre that had been hang-drying in the cheese cloth hoops overnight. We mixed the thick glorious mounds of fresh goat cheese into a tray and added salt. I did the honors of tasting several spoonfuls to make sure the salt was spread evenly. I'm always a little hesitant to offer up sophisticated tasting observations because most of the time I'm so excited about food that all my brain tells me is "mmmm tasty, now eat more." But I surprised myself in being able to pick out when the salt was inconsistent.


Fresh chevre takes almost two days to make. First, it has to rennet overnight in order to retain more moisture with a slower coagulation. Then, it has to dry overnight in hanging cheese cloths. Yet, it is an instantly gratifying cheese to make, because after those two days, it's ready to be packaged and sold right away. No aging room, no maintenance, no drama.

After last night's chevre chilled for a while, it was thrown into a crazy cheese-sausage-making contraption that squeezed out symmetrical 4-inch rolls for packaging. Some were sprinkled with herbs.

Next, we worked on the curd that had renneted overnight in the vat to use for a couple different cheeses. We spooned some of it into small molds that looked like plastic Dixie cups. These molds would then be flipped, but not pressed, much like Cato Corner's softer cheeses. The spooned curd will ripen and become one of their soft bloomy rind cheeses. Then, we scooped the rest of the curd in a large pitcher and poured it into cheese cloths to hang overnight for tomorrow's chevre. No hot and sweaty stirring, no cutting with giant wire harp cutters, no draining, no pressing. There was a fine art, however, to pouring the curd, which was a very wet, jello-like amorphous mass, and carefully gripping the cloth around the heavy wet blob to tie it so that everything didn't go spilling out from an errant corner. Plus, if the cord isn't tied tight enough while it is hanging, the cloth could slip out and spill all its cheese entrails on the floor.

While all this was happening, the milk in the second small vat was pasteurizing for that day's cheese, which would be a Camembert-style ripened cheese. In order to make fresh cheeses like chevre that cannot be aged, the milk has to be pasteurized. By federal law, anything made with raw milk has to age at least 60 days. That just won't fly with soft un-aged cheeses, such as chevre, ricotta or even many Camembert or Brie-style cheeses, that is unless you want a plateful of funky rubber in two months. Therefore, in this country, young fresh and soft-ripened cheeses have to be made with pasteurized milk. To accommodate this step, cheesemakers like Paul use a cheese vat that doubles as a pasteurizer. Once the milk heats for long enough to meet pasteurization requirements and then cools to avoid killing the rennet and culture, then everything can remain in the same vat and be added directly to it.

There wasn't much milk. The pasteurization, cooling, acidification and coagulation process, all taking place in the same vat, didn't require much time. By late afternoon we were hooping. Everything at this stage involved the same familiar concepts of cutting the curd and scooping it up in molds, but with one-tenth of the milk, almost no heat, and different equipment. We cut the curd by cutting lines in the gel with a basic kitchen knife and stirred only long enough to catch the big pieces we missed. With such a small vat it only took fifteen minutes to empty out the curd during hooping. The molds were the same ones we use at Cato Corner for Hooligans. We flipped the cheeses in the molds, of which there were only a few dozen (versus over 120 Hooligans at a time). Both vats cleaned and all done...at 2:30!

Though the day ends early and I lose far less fluids making goat cheese, there was a careful dance to balance the various batches and additional work of pasteurizing the cheese. On top of that, they make cheese every day of the week -- all seven of them -- so there is no reprieve. I'm glad I got the opportunity to broaden my experience while catching a glimpse of the goat-world with such an awesome crew.

Be it from a goat or from a cow, I still love eating both by the fistful. And now, I love making both. I'll pick cow when I need more cardio and weight training though.

The aging room. Less space required.
What no giant wheels of cheese?

I love baby animals so much. 

Meeting the Cheese Family Part 2: Fromage

Whaaaaa?!

The day I returned from visiting Saxelby's in New York, I drove down to visit Fromage, a cheese store in the pleasant coastal town of Old Saybrook, Connecticut. Somehow I scheduled consecutive visits to cheese stores that are polar opposites of each other. When I walked into Fromage, I stood in the doorway with my mouth gaping, mumbling to myself in hallucinatory disbelief for a few seconds because they had EVERYTHING. If someone asked me, "hey, where can I find the most baller specialty food store ever," I would send them to Fromage. From dishes and soaps to olive oils and chocolates, they are stocked. There were some things that made me question the desires of people with excess amounts of money. Gourmet baking sprinkles! I've never once in my life thought, hey you know what I want to spend ten bucks on? Sprinkles.

The most impressive thing was the giant chalkboard behind the counter with the epic list of cheeses available in the store. Instead of just focusing on one region or one country like Saxelby's, Fromage makes sure all bases are covered. They had fresh cheeses, American farmstead cheeses, imported cheeses, meats and an olive bar. She deals directly with many of the regional cheesemakers, but the rest, and particularly the imported cheeses, come from a distributor. Christine was yet another great person to meet and was very helpful in answering my questions despite being in the middle of a busy day of putting together party platters.

Whereas some might take such a vast variety of products and fashion a store that looks like an episode of Hoarders, Christine has designed a store that really looks like an art installation. It's truly fun to walk around in the store, browsing and staring at the giant chalkboard o' cheese. Her business has been open for 18 years and expanded to the larger location a few years ago. From a business perspective, she's been doing everything right and selling gobs of quality products. I've heard that the store can get ridiculously busy with fancy food flying off the shelves at peak times. She also benefits from being the only specialty food and cheese shop in that area of the state, which just happens to be fairly wealthy. Hey, I guess, one man's extravagance is another man's cake sprinkles. 

Like a loser, after each cheese shop meeting, I immediately went to a coffee shop or a bench on the subway where I could jot down every helpful piece of information I could remember. Three lessons I took away from my cheese shop visits: First, cheese people are great! It's like one big happy family of foodies, who are totally willing to help others find their dream. The more people I meet, the more confident I am that I made the right move in my life. Second, I have a lot to get my hands on. I knew my questions would be very basic and perhaps downright stupid. I had no concept of the work or money it took to start such cheese shop shenanigans. I still don't know much, but my questions and understanding are getting more sophisticated with experience. Third, I can totally do this. I was almost scared to ask about what went into the business plans and the financials, mostly for fear that it would be some astronomical feat that would end me. Turns out, it's within my reach with some confidence, conviction, and creativity. I'm sure alliteration helps as well.

Meeting the Cheese Family Part 1: Saxelby's

My Connecticut cheese bucket-list has been sitting around without much action on my part. With only three weeks left, I started making moves. There were several people nearby in the cheese industry that I had been hoping to meet over the summer. I set up several back-to-back meetings and the first stops were cheese stores in the area.

First on the list: meeting Anne Saxelby of Saxelby Cheesemongers in New York. Anne was a former intern at Cato Corner after college and went on to open her own successful (and delightfully cute) cheese store in New York City. Basically she's my hero and did almost exactly what I'm hoping to accomplish in a few years. 

Anne's store is a small cheese counter inside the Essex Market on the Lower East Side. For those not familiar with it or other indoor markets, imagine several small "stores" -- bread, produce, fish, even chocolate -- providing one-stop shopping at what amounts to a grocery shopping mall or a daily farmer's market on steroids. 

Saxelby's has a very focused selection of cheese from American artisanal cheesemakers, primarily from the Northeast. They also have yogurt, fresh cheeses (such as ricotta or mozzarella), and fresh bread from a local baker. It's nothing fancy, but they will whip you up a deliciously simple cheese sandwich with any of the cheeses, fresh bread, and a simple topping like olive oil.  I've had lots of cheese sandwiches before. Still, I had my face rocked clean off by Pleasant Ridge cheese on a small raisin roll that Katrina sent me away with after my visit. It might have been delirium from walking around in the heat all day, but as I sat in the park taking the sandwich out in two bites, I could have sworn it got me drunk.  

When I actually met Anne, we went for brunch in Brooklyn before her cheese radio show. I knew we had bonded when she ordered from the menu exactly how I like to roll. Three meals, share them all:  the fried chicken, the eggs, and the pancakes. It's a hearty giddiness for variety and a refusal to let anything delicious feel left out. (P.S. if you're in NYC go to Roberta's; it rules). 

In the studio with Anne

We cleaned our plates and I had plenty of time to pick Anne's brain about the business and how she got started. Then we headed over to the studio adjacent to the restaurant for her cheese radio show. Oh yeah I didn't make that part up. She has a show on an internet radio station called Cutting the Curd, during which she interviews a different illustrious and interesting person in the industry every week. I sat in as "guest host," a role in which I fear I may have made myself seem far too seasoned upon mentioning that I used to be a college radio d.j. Talking about cheesemaking was not quite the same as popping in Flaming Lips tracks at 3 in the morning for stoned 19-year-olds and pizza delivery kids...or is it?. Embarrassingly, I was not at all familiar with the cheese of the cheesemaker we were interviewing, nor did I know anything about the topic of herd migration and seasonal Alpine cheese production that we were discussing. In sum, I wasn't the best guest host. But I was still ridiculously excited that I was on a cheese radio show with the pros and, like a cheese nerd, thought I was somehow cooler for it.

The next day I visited the store and met with Katrina, who was runs the store when Anne isn't there. The retail area is ideal for low overhead because only a couple people at most could really fit back there at any given time.  What the store lacks in bling it makes up for in charm and friendliness. It has the exact unpretentious and welcoming attitude that I would want in my cheese shop. I also love that Anne has direct contact and relationships with all of the cheesemakers she does business with and often visits their farms. The day I returned from New York, I visited an equally awesome store but with a completely different philosophy....

Completely unrelated to visiting Saxelby's, but I was impressed
with the cheese plate offered at McSorley's in the East Village.