Fromages Pour Mes Amies!

Friday night girlfriends from my alternate internet universe were in town, and with the help of lovely Misty, the Whole Foods' cheese wench, I put together a cheese platter of ultimate deliciousness.

I asked for help at the Pasadena cheese counter, and she said she would be right with me. I hung out with the wine guy and grabbed some booze while waiting. When Misty arrived to help me, I told her I wanted some things unusual and delicious. She steered me the right way. All kinds of right.

First up was a hard goat cheese. This goat cheese was aged in Bordeaux, so the eatable rind retains some of the bordeaux redness and a trace of acidity to balance the creaminess of the goat flavor.


How beautiful is that?

Next up is Cesaria Speziata. This is a truffle cheese. Zomg. Who knew? I cannot find any information about this on the innertubes. However, it is stunningly delicioso.


Let me describe. It is a cow milk cheese, hard I suppose, but not as hard as a Parmesan or an Asiago. And throughout the cheese are tiny flakes of truffle. I want to research it to find out what kind of truffle, but I am having frustratingly little luck.

The beautiful rind is liberally dusted with cinnamon and cardomom. This adds a lovely earthy spice to the truffleocity. I am in love. If it were a man I would marry it. I would practice bigamy, happily, openly, naughtily.

Next up was another cheese not to shake a fist at. This is called Crescenza. Misty likened this to the inside of a brie, well described. It is also known as crescenza stracchino, is a soft-ripened cow's milk cheese with no rind, produced in Lombardy, Piedmont and Veneto. It is buttery with a rich, slightly tart flavor. It actually came in an almost liquidy state, in a small tightly wrapped plastic bag. If it were room temp, I would have had to pour it into the dish.

I also served a little pickle/olive plate from Whole Foods' olive bar. Kalamata olive spread, the leftovers I have plans for. I found a bass recipe that calls for kalamata olives minced from Bon Appetit.

I also added some cornichon, and some whole kalamata olives. Fig spread (like a jam, but not as sweet) and lavash evened out the offerings.

We drank wine, chatted face to face and had a lovely night.