Critical Cheese: Get Your Teut-on

Whereas France, Italy, and Switzerland have been basking throughout the cheese spotlight for lots of of years, completely different nations in Europe have quietly been perfecting delicious, purposeful, down-home cheeses that will positively rival their additional well-known counterparts. Germany and Austria, two nations not extensively acknowledged for the cheeses they produce, have been at it for a really very long time, and are solely starting to get noticed proper right here throughout the States.

Actually, when you occur to like smelly cheese, these two nations are making some amazingly pungent specimens that may downside your very notion of “edible.” New York Metropolis’s Murray’s Cheese simply recently began carrying a whole spate of unusual German and Austrian cheeses, 4 of which have been specializing in proper right here, after the soar.

Romadur is a supremely delicious raw cow’s milk cheese, with a supple texture and a rich, yeasty fashion. It’s a smear-ripened cheese, which means that the rind is smeared with brine by means of the 4-6 week getting older interval, in order to encourage the enlargement of micro organism that help break down the cheese and make it tasty. It’s made by the Bremenreid Cooperative throughout the Allgäu space of southwest Bavaria.

Weisslacker (or “white lacquer”) is a square-shaped, crumbly white cheese whose small measurement belies its intensely tart, pungent fashion. I’m afraid to say it’s barely too extremely efficient to let unfastened on a cheese plate, besides you’re serving it to some brave cheese lovers. Alternately you may grate it and serve it over Spätzle, or one other form of noodle, which, primarily based on Murray’s, is exactly what the Bavarians like to do with this one.

Bergkase Alt—really “earlier mountain cheese”—is an Austrian variation on Alpine cheeses like Gruyère or Comté. It’s a raw cow’s milk cheese, aged for about 10 months, and its texture is clear and elastic, and dotted with small pea-sized eyes (holes). It’s a bit drier and additional grainy than its Swiss and French cousins, nonetheless it has the an identical nutty, sweet style that characterizes such cheeses. Will probably be good in fondue, or melted proper right into a grilled cheese sandwich on pumpernickel.

Bachensteiner, from the Bregenz Forest in western Austria, is unquestionably basically essentially the most foul smelling cheese I’ve ever encountered. I cannot, in good conscience, relate to you exactly what this cheese smells like, for fear that it might spoil your urge for meals. However it tastes good! The cheese is rather more delicate in your mouth than your nostril. It’s acquired an earthy, meaty style and a semi-firm texture that goes good on a hefty darkish bread. It’s a raw cow’s milk cheese, aged only for 4 to 6 weeks, and fashioned like a gold bar. Warning: this cheese should solely be served to close associates and sympathetic kin. It’s odor would possibly flip off even basically essentially the most open-minded foodies. You are forewarned.

In case you’re an formidable caseophile, it’s best to think about getting your fingers on just a few of those. They might practically positively improve your cheese horizon. Moreover, I in truth can not think about a larger time of yr to interrupt out your lederhosen, pour some Riesling, and feast in your super-stinky variety of unusual Teutonic cheeses.