Everybody knows that New York City is the great melting pot. When it comes to looking for cheese, the whole world is, quite literally, a subway ride away. Manhattan’s cheese sellers have some of the most diverse and delicious selections of famous fromage from all over the world.
Parents looking to encourage kids to eat more cheese may be in luck. Food scientists at the Center for Dairy Research at The University of Wisconsin in Madison have produced a process for making cheese flavored with such children-friendly flavors as cotton candy, berry, banana, green apple and chocolate.
A shoe with a Stilton wedge heel is the latest tactic being used by the Cambridgeshire village of Stilton in the United Kingdom to get its Blue Bell cheese officially recognized. Resident Richard Landy is seeking to overturn an October 2013 decision refusing to recognize the cheese as Stilton by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).
I have a dear friend who calls Manhattan home. We share a passion for all things culinary and anything involving curds and whey. She visited Denver a decade ago during the National Western Stock Show and saw a Grand Champion steer corralled in the lobby of the Brown Palace Hotel. The only cheese she recalls tasting here was florescent orange and poured over nachos at a Denver Broncos game.
Since then she has referred to Denver as “that cowtown,” and visited only long enough to change planes for Aspen.
As guests stroll into the dining room of Osteria del Principe on Manhattan’s East 23rd Street, one of the first sights to greet them is a large glass display case built into the counter of the restaurant’s gleaming exhibition kitchen. The cabinet prominently exhibits a cornucopia of salumi, or cured Italian meats — prosciutto di Parma, speck, mortadella, bresaola, and, not least of all, aged prosciutto di San Daniele.
The grass is so green it looks as though someone painted it fresh that morning, the stream running through the field clear and teaming with wildlife, and only the distant sound of birdsong is around to keep one company.
It is the type of idyllic scene that tempts people from all over the world to endure airport security, the dragging of luggage and the annoyance of jet lag, to travel to County Cork in Ireland to sample a little of the quiet life on offer here.
When we think of specialty cheese, we think of its accompaniments—wine, beer, fruit, jam and perhaps a platter of charcuterie—but the cheese itself is generally always served fresh and in its original form, served pure and simple.
It’s like the world hit the refresh button. Everything is coming alive, babies are being born, daffodils and spring onions are peeping up through the soil that has been opened due to the freezing and thawing of winter months.