The Cheese Days of August: The August Cheese Explorer's Club
Welcome to the month that all New England likes to forget, August. The month where humidity decides to take a staycation and hang out long past its welcome. Whether you call them the dog days of summer or, well, something I just can’t print here, we know the feeling. We don’t want to go outside, we want to stay in, or find the nearest beach or pool that’s available, and in these days, socially distant enough for safety.
With that in mind, the August Cheese Explorer’s Club is built around cheeses that reflect the heat of summer and bring some freshness and bite to get us through.
I grew up on tomato mozzarella salad in the summer, and my family loved it enough that we tried to make it a year round thing, but August was the perfect time of year for peak ripe tomatoes. That perfect late summer dish has stuck with me ever since, and I’ve included possibly the only way to improve on mozzarella, Burrata.
Narragansett Creamery Burrata
While the classic Ovoline shape is the most ubiquitous, Burrata is one of those variants that is best in the summer. While Burrata is made from Mozzarella, it’s not technically Mozzarella, but rather a ball of fresh mozzarella that’s filled with stracciatella, or shredded mozzarella, and sweet cream.
The story goes that Burrata was created to help farmers keep the waste of fresh cheeses down. Day old mozzarella would be shredded and then soaked in fresh cream before being wrapped in the fresh curd.
In keeping with that fresh cheese spirit, we’ve included the freshest batch of Narragansett Creamery’s Burrata to kick things off for the club.
Head southwest some 60 miles from Narragansett Creamery and you’ll find Cato Corner Farm, where they make raw farmstead cheese by hand from their herd of 45 Jersey Cows.
Not to get too nitty gritty into the technical details, but milk type is important in cheesemaking, and that goes beyond just using cows, goats, sheep, buffalo, camels, or yaks. Certain breeds of cows are prized for the level of fat and protein present in their milk, and Jerseys have some of the highest content in both.
Liz MacAlister and Mark Gillman are the mother and son team behind Cato Corner, with Liz maintaining the farm and herd, and Mark making the cheeses and focusing on the other business aspects.
Hooligan is probably one of their most famous cheeses, a washed rind cheese that benefits from the hay rich feed they give the cows in the late fall and winter, but we wanted a cheese that show’s the peak of summer, and that’s what this extra aged Bloomsday is all about.
Extra Aged Bloomsday from Cato Corner Farm.
Named for the 16th of June 1904, a prominent date in James Joyce’s Ulysses (Gillman was a English teacher before he became head cheesemaker), Bloomsday was a happy accident, a recipe that Gillman stumbled upon while trying to make an entirely different cheese.
Not quite an alpine, Bloomsday is nevertheless the picture perfect example of what great milk and a grass-fed diet does for cheese, with the carotin present in the grass giving the paste a rich amber flecked yellow hue.
We were extraordinarily lucky to get our hands on this exceptional Extra-Aged wheel of Bloomsday, and it combines the bright bite of a cheddar with a subtle sweet and savory finish.
Another exclusive limited run cheese we were able to get our hands on recently comes to us from another single source dairy focused on Jersey Cow milk, Woodcock Farm located some 155 miles north of the Cato Corner Farm in Weston, Vermont.
Mark and Gari Fischer make some of my favorite cheeses from the Green Mountain state, raising East Friesian sheep and also sourcing their Jersey cow milk from a neighboring farm. Magic Mountain is an alpine style cheese, typically aged 8 - 14 months using all Jersey cow’s milk, which develops a beef bone broth savory undertone as it ages.
Magic Mountain Reserve from Woodcock Farm.
This particular wheel selected in this cheese club was made in 2018, and has been carefully cave aged ever since. We get lots of notes of summer hay, candied almonds, fried leeks, bone broth, and of course the paste is packed full of cheese crystals. We were one of the few lucky cheese shops to get our hands on this batch, and we’re thrilled to pass it on to you.
Sweet Emotions from Lazy Lady Farm
Travel another 155 miles north and you’ll arrive at Lazy Lady Farm in Westfield, Vermont. Laney Fondiller is a national treasure, and she’s been making cheese with her prized herd of goats since the 80s, with a steady diet of rotational feeding and NPR on the radio while milking. At any given time she has about 15 different makes of cheese, a combination of a restless drive and endless curiosity. Sweet Emotions is a recent favorite of ours, a mixed milk bloomy rind with a mousse like buttery texture, the combination of milk from her goat herd and cream from Butterworks Farm, a highly prized organic dairy also in Westfield, Vermont.
Tomme Brulee from Rudolphe Meunier.
Last but not least, I’m thrilled to have one of my favorite sheep cheeses back, a Basque cheese from the Pyrenees that is a fixture on any cheese plate that I bring home, the Tomme Brulee. These little wheels are aged for 3 months before being exposed to open flame, toasting the rind and giving the cheese notes of browned butter and a touch of caramelized sweetness.
Doce de Tomate from Obidos, Portugal.
For accompaniment, we’ve included Doce de Tomate, a Tomato Jam sourced from Obidos, a little inland from the Atlantic coast in Portugal, and picked during the peak of the summer, as well as Toketti - my latest snacking fix, a Sardinian flatbread cracker that is like a fried wonton but better.
Toketti di Pane Carasau
The Rundown:
Narragansett Burrata - our favorite local rendition of the Italian classic, Perfect for tomato salads with Olive Oil, Salt, Pepper, and Fresh Basil. Providence, RI
Extra Aged Bloomsday - A happy accident made by a former English teacher at Cato Corner in Colchester, Connecticut. For fans of cheddar looking to expand beyond the classic block. Raw Farmstead Jersey Cow’s Milk.
Magic Mountain Reserve - a special hand-picked cave aged wheel from Mark and Gari Fischer in Weston, Vermont at Woodcock Farm. Over 20 months old! Single Source Raw Jersey Cow’s Milk.
Sweet Emotions - mixed milk bloomy rind sourced from Lainey Fondiller’s goat herd and Butterworks Farm cow cream. A decadent mousse-like delight from Westfield, Vermont. Pasteurized Goat’s Milk and Pasteurized Organic Cow Cream.
Tomme Brulee - Aged by the excellent Rudolphe Meunier in France, this Basque sheep’s milk cheese from the Pyrenees is full of brown butter and caramel flavor. Pasteurized sheep’s milk.
Doce de Tomate - a lovely tomato jam from the Portuguese and Spanish border which uses tomatoes picked at the height of summer.
Toketti di Pane Carasau - A Sardinian flatbread cracker made with semolina flour and dangerously addictive.