The Magazine of Tasteful Living!
Fresh flavors are a great place to start when selecting picnic picks. Nothing says summertime like a cheerful, delicious picnic spread unfurled on a blanket in a park, on a beach, or in a garden. Ideally, the sun is shining, you’re surrounded by your favorite people, and you can relax
This specialty ham hails from a province in northeastern Italy, but has a Bavarian background. For those not familiar with speck, a cured and smoked ham, looking at its origins presents a conundrum. The German name for bacon, speck originates from South Tyrol, which, although located in northeastern Italy, has
This cheese is a story of generations of tradition, expertise and innovation. I was on a trip to the Jura Mountains learning about Comté when a cheesemaker took me aside. “There’s no such thing as Comté,” he says. “It’s Comtés. Every single wheel is unique.” The same thing can be
Packing worlds of flavor and functionality. A hybrid generally refers to an animal or plant that is the result of breeding two different types of the same species, usually to improve upon some trait or traits. Such crossbreeding can produce a grape that withstands cooler climates or a cow that
Walk into Willow on the Green, a quaint shop located in the Inner Sunset neighborhood of San Francisco across from the Golden Gate Park, and you’ll find 40 or more types of cheese made in the United Kingdom. There are Scottish favorites like Anster, a firm, crumbly, slightly tangy farmhouse
At the foot of the Acropolis in Athens lies the Acropolis Museum, a repository of treasures recovered from the hilltop site of ancient temples and edifices. From the museum’s cafe, you can gaze up, toward the Parthenon, the rebuilt fifth-century B.C. temple of Athena that sits on top of the
Blue can be one of those love-or-hate, one-and-done types of cheeses. But there is an entire world of these cheeses, each with its own combination of sharp, salty, tangy taste and soft, creamy texture. Take Northern Spain’s iconic Cabrales for example. In August, global headlines broadcast a 4.5-pound wheel of this artisan blue sold at auction for $32,000, awarding it a world record for the most expensive cheese. Even if a $6,000 per pound cheese was in your grocery budget, you’d have to travel to Spain’s principality of Asturias to sample this highly perishable product.
Grana Padano, one of the world’s most ancient hard cheeses, is truly beloved. It’s the most popular cheese in Italy and the most widely consumed Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) cheese in the world, with over 5 million wheels made each year with almost a quarter of Italy’s milk production. There’s good reason it’s so sought after and celebrated. The firm, crumbly wheels are luxuriously sweet, nutty, fragrant and outstanding.
Mortadella has a long history and remains a highly regarded meat from Italy. The bologna from Bologna that’s not bologna, it’s Mortadella It’s morning, or about to be, in the forest. The oak trees have yet to wake to the glimmer of the morning sun, but the forest floor is
Learn all about these cheeses and what makes them unique. France has delicious cheese around every corner, but only the most special and historically significant ones can earn the AOC or Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée designation. The highly regulated status is used to protect agricultural products that are tied to a
This Italian favorite has a number of imitations, but is distinguished by sheep milk. Napoleon is accredited with the observation that “an army marches on its stomach.” Indeed, if you want to keep an army on its feet, you need food that is cheap, portable and nutritious. It doesn’t hurt
Learn about the science, art and magic behind this crucial aspect of cheesemaking. We don’t have a word in the English language for the process of aging cheese, or the work of a cheese ager. So, we tend to borrow the French terminology. In French, the word affinage means “to
