People from Wisconsin have been known to call themselves “cheeseheads” — and if you’ve ever watched a Green Bay Packers football game, you’ve doubtless seen those folks in the crowd wearing the yellow foam rubber cheese wedges on their heads!! (I wish I could say I’ve never owned one of those, but, well — hey, I grew up in Wisconsin and it’s in the water or something!)
Anyway, the good news is that America’s Dairyland really does have lots of good cheese … or at least, it did when I was a kid. I remember making periodic journeys to my parents’ favorite dairy. Just thinking about it, I can smell the raw milk. Like most cheese “factories,” this small place had a little cheese shop attached to the production floor. These were always simple little places, usually with several coolers serving as the counters. We would point through the glass at the cheeses we were interested in and they would serve up thinly sliced samples. Mmmmm… My parents were fans of the fresh colby. But the best thing of all, my sister and I thought, was the squeaky-fresh cheese curds! My dad loves them, too, so I don’t think we ever left a cheese shop without at least a pound. And as soon as we got in the car, look out: the bag was open and we were into them! I haven’t had a decent cheese curd — a squeaky, mild, young curd — since I moved away. What passes for cheese curds in the grocery stores today is more like funky-shaped mild cheddar with a strange, pasty consistency. Ick.
Of course many things have changed since I was a kid. In the seventies and eighties, there were many more small, family farms, but as a result of corporate forces those little family farms that kept my friends and I in new shoes have almost disappeared. Likewise, many local dairies have been bought up by big companies.
So the mainstream world of cheese in the US has changed, and surely the same is true in Wisconsin. But the good news is that there is a growing, underground “artisan” cheese movement in the States, and for anyone who loves cheese this is thrilling. I’m far from a cheese snob, but still I think my taste in cheese has evolved significantly in the past thirty years. I wasn’t exposed to many unusual cheeses as a kid, so it’s taken a while for me to experience and appreciate the tastes of cheeses you don’t see in the average grocer’s cooler. Things like red dragon, brie and the varieties of goat or sheep cheeses. It took time for some of these cheese to seem palatable, but they really do grow on you.
My latest interest is in finding a source of Halloumi, a cheese indigenous to Cyprus. I first heard about it two or three months ago listening to American Public Radio’s Splendid Table. It’s made from a mix of goat and sheep’s milk and is white and layered like mozarella. What caught my attention was that this cheese can be browned by frying or grilling it! I’m already a fan of the East Indian paneer cheese, chunks of which taste so good served in korma sauce and the like. So hearing about this roastable cheese got me very curious! Unfortunately, so far I haven’t come across it, despite looking while in a couple different large cities. Evidentally it is being sold in Canada as “hallomi” (minus the “u”) because of a protected designation of origin dispute.
So, if anyone out there knows of a good source, I’d love to hear about it. (There are several online, but I’d like to find a domestic source … though no doubt those wouldn’t be quite the same as the real thing from Cyprus.) Meantime, I’ll don my foam cheese wedge and keep looking for other interesting cheeses to try!
