French cheese....and Friday rant

I know I've ranted about the state of cheese in the United States before. But I'm going to do it again, and go more in detail about the cheese itself.

The United States does have some very good hard cheeses. Like cheddar. I love me some sharp cheddar, great for a snack, and it can still be made pretty tasty even when lower in fat than the regular kind. We also make the world's worst cheeses, including Cheez Whiz (cheese in a can? Seriously? And yes, I did eat this as a kid, I will admit it) and American cheese (I'm convinced that cheese-flavored is as much a euphemism as is watermelon-flavored for Jolly Ranchers. I love Watermelon Jolly Ranchers, but seriously, they don't taste like watermelon. I don't love American cheese).

France, however, has some of the best cheeses. Ever. Part of the reason for that is the use of raw milk in their cheese (not pasteurizing, which is the heating of the milk to a certain temperature to kill the bacteria). Now, pasteurizing was invented for a reason. Hell, my high school was on Avenue Louis Pasteur, so it's a major step in science. But I have to say that cheese that hasn't been pasteurized is oh so yummy. I'm not a big fan of the moldy cheese, like Roquefort or Gorgonzola, but the rest are very tasty. Here are some examples:

Brie is ubiquitous in Cheeseland. Every party you go to has it. Now, here in the States, Brie has a fairly bland, rather ho-hum flavor, and to me seems more like spreadable cheese (preprocessed) than real cheese (brie here, even if it was made in France, tends to be pasteurized). It can still be tasty, depending on the batch, but it's a shadow of tasty. Now, compared to other French cheeses, brie does have a very mild flavor. But it's got more flavor than the stuff here.

One of my favorites is camembert. This is also a wheel and looks rather like brie. But it's got a much stronger flavor. I've heard people say that you know the camembert is ready to eat when it smells like stinky socks. I've also heard that it was a great cheese for poorer families because you take out a slice, leave it to sit for a little while, and the soft cheese will fill in the area you sliced out (though I imagine this would reduce the overall size of the cheese). Camembert is also available in the States, often pasteurized, and on the grand scheme of things is relatively mild (though stronger than brie).

Chevre (goat cheese) is one of my absolute favorites. My local farmer's market has a stand which sells goat cheese in various flavors (citrus lavendar, orange cardamom, chive, pepper, etc), and it's still yummy even though the flavor of the cheese isn't very strong. In Paris, I had slices of goat cheese on baguette, topped with a softer cheese (I'm not sure if it was parmesan or what) and then baked in the oven. Absolute heaven!

Comte (com-tay, I don't have accents) is a hard French cheese which is rather mild but also fairly nutty in flavor. It's great on a stiffer bread than baguette, like a rustic loaf of some kind. The cheese was originally made to nourish shepherds who were on the road for long periods of time, so the cheese would stay good for months (can you imagine?! I should go buy some of this, if they have it, because it takes me a long time to eat cheese!)

Emmental (Swiss) is a cheese I've never really gotten behind. At least, in the US incarnation. I know tons of kids loved the holey cheese on their sandwiches, and I was just never a fan. It's still not one of my favorites, but I at least find the real emmental to be palatable in small doses (ringing endorsement, isn't it?).

Roquefort is the characteric moldy cheese that scares a lot of people. We've been conditioned by evolution to avoid mold and nasty-looking stuff to safeguard our health. But the French have figured out a way to harness the mold in a tasty way. It's also known as the "King of Cheeses" but maybe that's just because the bright blue/green mold will scare away the other cheeses, or cow them into submission. I now feel like I should go back and try it again. And hey, a little penicillin couldn't hurt, right?

There are so many more French cheeses, it's not even funny (there are about 500 different kinds). As much as France is known for wine, it's known for cheese. Here's a wikipedia page listing a bunch of them (though it isn't an exhaustive list). One of my favorites when I was in Toulouse was a hard mountain cheese that for the life of me I can't remember the name of (except that it started with an M), but I had the impression it was more of a local cheese, so I don't think I'd be able to find it around here.

I understand the reasoning behind the laws against raw milk. They don't want people to get sick. But seriously, millions of people every day in this country eat McDonald's, which is even worse (yeah, cheese has bacteria and saturated fat, but McDo's has tons of chemicals on top of the saturated and trans fats). I think we should be able to make raw milk cheese in this country (though given we don't have a culture of it, it probably wouldn't be as good as European cheese for a good while), and just put labels on it saying that it could potentially be dangerous. I mean, hell, that's what we do with cigarettes. There are warnings on cigarettes that they could kill you or give you cancer or whatever, there are warnings on alcohol to warn pregnant women about its effects. If people disregard those warnings, that's their own problem.

My two cents. Finis.

The Wonderful World of Garlic

So we've known for a while that garlic's good for us. Those Mediterranean folks were way ahead of the curve on that one - garlic is such an integral component of Italian, French, Spanish (I think), and Middle Eastern cooking.

Garlic adds some definite yumminess to any recipe, whether it be eggplant parm, vodka tomato sauce, American chop suey, or Jamaican spinach. Too much, however, and people are going to start thinking you're trying to stave off vampires (and everyone else for that matter).

Garlic Curiosity

When I lived in St Louis, there was a Middle Eastern restaurant (I don't remember what kind) that had a garlic festival every year. I never attended, but one of the things that stood out on the advertisement is that they serve garlic juice. Yes, you read that right, garlic juice (and I don't mean this kind of garlic juice, which you use to spray on food). Now, this sounds about as appealing to me as, say, parsley juice or olive oil ice cream.

But wait!

I've tried olive oil ice cream. And it's not half bad. It definitely tasted like olive oil, but it was also sweet, so it tasted like ice cream. I didn't get a full scoop, just one of those tasters (Toscanini's), but it was very interesting to try.

I imagine that they don't make garlic juice taste like you just squeezed out garlic into a glass. They must add something to balance it out a little. I'm having trouble finding info about it online, however.

What's the strangest garlicky food you've come across?

The Debate

So the debate comes in, fresh garlic or bottled garlic? I always use bottled, minced garlic because it's easier (and a hell of a lot faster). I don't mind getting the smell of garlic on my hands, but it's kind of a pain to peel it, then chop it, then clean the cutting board afterwards.

Well, the part of garlic that gives it its characteristic smell is called Allicin. It's widely promoted for anti-bacterial properties, fighting infections and preventing bacteria-related food poisoning (ref: WebMD). But Allicin is fragile and disappears quickly and crushed fresh garlic is more stable and has higher levels of Allicin than preserved versions. Garlic stored in water (which is what I use) had Allicin levels decrease by half in about six days (six days?! I keep minced garlic around for months!), and in vegetable oil within the span of a few hours.

That's not to say that preserved garlic doesn't still have beneficial properties, because it does. It's just not as good as the fresh stuff.

Cheesy garlic bread

Yesterday for lunch I had some leftover cauliflower leek soup. But I wanted some kind of healthy carb to go with it, so I decided to make some toast. But just plain toast isn't so interested, even considering that the 7-grain date bread I eat is very yummy. So I made some cheesy garlic bread.

2-4T olive oil
t minced garlic
asiago cheese (enough that the cheese is coated in the oil)
salt and pepper

Mix the ingredients in a small bowl and lay in a thin layer over a slice of bread. Bake at 400 until warm and cheese is slightly melty. In the past, I've made just plain cheese bread, and the heat of the oven bakes the cheese until it's hard and crunchy in no time at all. This version with the added olive oil keeps the cheese moist and yummy, not drying it out. The dates in the bread also gave it a slightly sweet flavor to go with the salty cheese.

Friday Rant - Where'd the cheese go?

Ok, so we have plenty of cheese in this country. We have cheddar out the wazoo, in all different levels of sharp (extra sharp=extra yummy), we have Swiss, we have parmesan and mozzarella (my farmer's market sells some seriously yummy mozzarella every friday). So yes, we have options. But seriously, where'd all the really tasty cheese go? I'm talking the melty, smells-like-old-socks kind of cheese that explodes on your tongue like a scrumptious dairy bomb. Or the subtle hard cheese that pairs with wine and is just impossible to stop eating. There's triple-creme brie, melted goat cheese on bread, hard mountain cheese. We have goat cheese here yes, but the goat cheese I've liked the most has other flavors in it (citrus lavendar, orange cardamom), so it's less about the cheese appreciation as the flavor and the pairing with bread.

So where'd all that cheese go?

The problem in the states is the pasteurization (heating the milk to kill of the bacteria before making the cheese). There are restrictions on who can make and sell cheese, and for good reason (listeria and e coli). But while pasteurization does definitely cut down on the negative side effects of cheese, people have been eating cheese for a hell of a lot longer than pasteurization has been around. The French eat unpasteurized cheese all the time, and do we ever hear about massive e coli outbreaks in France? Non, pas du tout. The e coli outbreaks we hear about are in the US involving meat (don't get me started on the meat packing plants) and spinach.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't pasteurize, because pasteurization was a great advance and is definitely useful (especially for pregnant women who don't want to chance exposing their baby to bacteria). I just want the option to eat non-pasteurized cheese without paying an arm and a leg. The raw-milk cheese on the market here has to sit for more than 60 days before it can be sold, because the bacteria is most likely to occue in the first 60 days (I'm presuming they test the cheese before they sell it). So basically, the two most popular soft cheeses in the world (brie and camembert) must be pasteurized because they can't sit around for 60 days. And have you tried pasteurized brie? It tastes vaguely like cheese, but basically amounts to a high calorie, high fat cheese-textured spread.

And American cheese? Seriously, I think that was a psychology experiment to figure out how much BS we'd believe if they told us it was cheese. I know lots of kids like it (I did when I was a kid), but man, that stuff isn't natural!

I've gotten some very fragrant, mouth watering cheeses at cheese shops near me. But for a small wheel (maybe 4-5 inches in diameter), it'll run me anywhere from $10-$20. So I usually stick with flavored goat cheese and mozzarella, and occasionally spring for something fancier if it's in my budget.

I'll run through some of the really tasty cheese isn't another, non-rant post. But what are all your thoughts on cheese and pasteurization? Have you had European cheese made from raw milk? What kinds of cheese do you prefer?