A healthy Italian cheese with gusto. Beloved in its Italian homeland and throughout Europe, Grana Padano cheese was a familiar sight on the dinner table when chef Danilo Cortellini was growing up in the Abruzzo region. Now Cortellini is passing that tradition on to his own family, and to visitors to the Italian Embassy in…
Casu Marzu: An Illegal Cheese
Those with a weak stomach may want to stop reading now, as there is an Italian cheese delicacy that is not for the faint of heart. In a past issue, Cheese Connoisseur detailed the making of Anthill cheese, chèvre topped with citrus-flavored ants originating from Australia. Italy’s Casu Marzu takes pairing cheese and insects a…
Bringing Italy’s Finest to the U.S.: Ambrosi Food USA’s CEO Giacomo Veraldi
One man’s mission to increase awareness of an Italian cheesemakers authentic offerings. When Italian Giacomo Veraldi joined Ambrosi in 2007, little did he know how far his mission to market the company’s cheeses would take him. Fast forward almost a decade and a half later, and his goal to make a name for the company’s…
Reflecting Its Roots: Lively Run Dairy’s Finger Lakes Reserve
Good things happen when cheese has the back of the region it’s created in. Interlaken, NY-based Lively Run Dairy’s focus is on supporting family farms and using their milk to make original cheese. One of its most heralded is Finger Lakes Reserve, which won first place at the 2019 American Cheese Society (ACS) conference in…
A Sustainable Cheese Company
Mozzarella has been a boon for Wisconsin’s Crave Brothers Farmstead Cheese. In the early 80s, a group of four brothers acquired a farm in Waterloo, WI and started raising and milking 90 cows on a 200-acre property. Today, the farm is still run by brothers Charles, Thomas and Mark, while brother George and his wife…
Tradition and French AOC Cheeses
It’s all about the history, terroir, quality and flavor imparted in France. In 1962, French President Charles de Gaulle famously mused, “How can you govern a country that has 246 varieties of cheese?” While the point holds true, de Gaulle’s estimate was a lowball—France boasts closer to 1,600 varieties of cheese, which is a whole…
Testing a Monger Model
Cheesemongers at Chicago’s Beautiful Rind provide customers full service and education. Opening up his new Chicago cheese shop/foodservice operation, Beautiful Rind, during a pandemic obviously wasn’t ideal, but owner Randall Felts was still able to make a statement in the city’s trendy Logan Square neighborhood.
The Luxurious Truffle Cheese
The sought after fungi takes cheese to unique heights. When we think of luxurious food ingredients, few carry the mystique, or command the price tag, of truffles. The fungi, not the chocolates.
Pioneer of Artisan Goat Cheese: Cypress Grove’s Founder MARY KEEHN
Learn how a small time producer spearheaded America’s goat cheese segment. When Mary Keehn, a single mother of four and self-proclaimed serious hippie, adopted two of her neighbor’s goats back in the 70s, she didn’t have a business plan, or any plan, to start her own business. “My start was serendipic and an offshoot of…
Kefir and Lassi POPULARITY CONTINUES
With a bevy of health benefits, both kefir and lassi have become more prevalent in the U.S. The yogurt aisle at the grocery stores has boomed in recent years, as people have discovered the many health benefits of this probiotic-rich food. But there’s other dairy products that are also making big resurgences. Kefir and lassi…
Italy’s Coveted PECORINO DI PIENZA
A cheese that reflects its impressive history. Pienza is one of Tuscany’s most enchanting towns. Its only 2,000 inhabitants have the privilege of living in an ancient environment full of history that was admitted to the prestigious UNESCO list of world inheritance places in 1996. But the wonder doesn’t stop here, because Pienza is also…
A “Little” Love for Cheese
Georgia’s Sweet Grass Dairy At Thomasville, GA’s Sweet Grass Dairy, it’s the bovines that set its cheese apart. The operation is owned by the husband and wife duo of Jeremy and Jessica Little, who together run the cheese production facility as well as a cheese shop and restaurant. Jeremy serves as head cheesemaker and focuses…