Stinky Cheese Chronicles: Cheese Concession

Cheese Concession...

I was tossing and turning in bed last night and realized that I totally forgot to introduce what cheese is... How can someone write a blog about cheese and forget to mention what exactly cheese is, how it is made, and where it comes from? I got ahead of myself and assumed that everyone was a cheese connoisseur so, I am apologizing! For those of you who do not know what cheese is, here is my condensed explanation of what it is and the kind of classification that cheese has. Or, maybe not so condensed explanation...

Cheese is one of the oldest and widely known foods known to mankind. Almost every culture produces some varietal of cheese, besides Asian countries. Cheese is know as fromage in France and fromaggio in Italian. Cheese can be served alone, added into sauces, and added as a flavor profile into other dishes. Cheese is versatile to use and is a staple to many cultures dietary needs. Cheeses are made all over the world, each culture has their own interpretation of how to cheese should taste, how long it should be aged, and what shapes it can be molded too. Cheese comes from tradition and many of the cheeses that we eat today are still made in the fashion they were produced from the beginning of the cheese evolution.

Cheese starts with milk. Cheese production today usually uses 3 different types of mammals milk which includes: cows, goat, and sheep. Each mammal's milk has a different flavor profile which helps to determine the flavor of the cheese and some cheeses use a combination of different mammal's milk. Casein or milk protein are coagulated with the addition of an enzyme usually rennnet, which sepereate the milk into curds (solids) and whey (liquid). The whey is then drained off and the curds is what is used to make fresh cheese (ricotta). To make a firmer cheese the curds are processed by cutting, kneading, and cooking which creates "green cheese" and that "green cheese" is molded into their preferred shapes. The last step is to salt or add special bacteria cultures to the cheese and let them age in a controlled environment to help develop the cheese's structure, flavor, color, and texture. Isn't cheese super interesting? Each cheese is aged differently and creates all the different varieties that we have today!

I think it was said best that, "cheeses are a product of their environment". Which simply means cheeses are a product of the land... or terrior which in French translates to "land".Usually the word terrior is used when talking about wine and coffee but it can also be used to describe cheese because the special characteristics of the geography of where the animals were raised, geology of the land, climate, micro climates, grazing grasses, bacteria and spores in the air, molds, wind and storage areas help to develop the distinct flavor of each cheese and gives them their unique characteristics.

Got to go the the gym now, if I am going to continue to eat cheese I have to stay fit ! BBL = Be Back Later to finish the post SYS=See You Soon!

So, back from working out so I can devour some more cheeses... Where were we?

A lot of cheeses have a rind on the outside of the cheese. There a couple of different kinds of rinds for cheeses which includes a bloomy rind that is caused by bacteria, a washed rind that is caused by repeated washing with brine, a brown wax rind that usually come on smoked cheeses and helps to keep moisture in the cheese and an artificial wax rind that is placed on the cheese to keep moisture in.

Simple Rules of Cheese

lower the moisture in cheese the harder the cheese will be/ great for grating/will keep for several weeks/no moisture equals less chance for bacteria growth
higher the moisture in cheese the softer it will be/ creamier it will be/ contain more fat/ will not keep as well due to moisture content
Raw-milk cheeses by FDA regulations must be aged 60 days or longer at a temperature 35 degree F. and above

The Big Cheese

My addiction for cheese started at a very young age. My father, we can call him TBC (the big cheese) exposed me and my little brother, TOFU, to all different types of food as children. My father owned a chain of Chinese restaurants in Ohio and TOFU and I would wait up for him to come home and share his dinner with him. TBC taught my brother and I how to eat pate, cheeses from all over the world, sardines, lobster, Spanish tapas, terrines, and anything that we were willing to try. My family has always had a passion for food which extends out to not just my family but my extended family. If there is one thing my family knows how to do is eat well. There is never a shortage of food in our family and every person in my family and extended family knows how to cook. Family holidays were amazing and included foods from my Aunt GooGoo, her moo shu pork and homemade moo shu pork skins are the best in the world, my mom KiKi's famous prime rib roast and au jus, my grandmother's HMN delicious Korean side dishes and homemade kimchee and anything TBC would make. So, if you haven't figured it out I come from Asian heritage.. my mom is Korean and my father is Chinese which would make me the best of both worlds which helped to develop who I am as a Chef. It's funny that I love cheese so much since Asian's tend to be Lactose-Intolerant which is a condition where the body cannot metabolize lactose. To all my Lactose-Intolerant friends... DY this means you I am sorry because you are missing out on some really great food!

My Families Food