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02/17/2016 06:00 AMAs a regular at Madison Cheese, a cheese shop and café tucked in a row of buildings just off the main street in Madison’s retail and restaurant district, I was pleased to find out recently that Fawn Nebinger, the owner, was planning a cheese tasting.
I love cheese. I read recently it’s addictive and wouldn’t argue with that. Not only do I frequent Madison Cheese, but I also love going to Fromage in Old Saybrook, Caseus in New Haven, and look forward to visiting The Cheese Shop of Centerbrook, heartily recommended by several friends. Most cheese shops, including all of those listed, encourage customers to try before they buy, and to sample new arrivals. Some have informal cheese tastings, and cheese classes. But this would be my first formal cheese tasting.
When I arrived that Thursday night at 6:30 p.m. in the back of the cheese shop on Samson Rock Drive, I saw Michael Hafford, the pastry chef and innkeeper at Scranton Seahorse Inn in Madison, just down the street and around the corner from the cheese shop. I sat next to Hafford, an accomplished chef in his own right, and we were soon joined at our table by Ron Crawford, a businessman from Guilford, who immediately offered to share his bottle of wine.
We soon learned that Crawford was a fellow foodie, one who has traveled to more than 40 countries, leaving him with many culinary adventures to share. It was Crawford’s first formal cheese tasting. Hafford had taken an eight-week cheese course in New York City, so it wasn’t exactly his first rodeo. The rest of the group, a convivial crowd from the start, all given to passing around and sharing their bottles of wine, came from all over southern Connecticut and they included cheese newbies and those with experienced palates. There were several other adults, along with a 10 year-old boy from Clinton, and a six month-old baby from Portland.
The 10 year-old boy, Luke Perrotti, behaved beautifully throughout. His mother, Ellen Schnier, said he planned to share his experience with the rest of his classmates at his school the following day. As for that six month-old baby? More on him later.
A Few Favorites
Nebinger’s theme for the evening was “crowd-pleasing favorites,” and she started by discussing some broad categories of cheese, from U.S. factory mass produced (“animals often badly cared for, less flavorful cheese with questionable nutrition”) to “farmstead produced” (“artisanal cheese taken to the next level,” “made by hand on the farm where the animals graze,” and, sometimes, “may be too much for the cheese novice, but are sought out by cheese snobs and foodies”).
She also talked about the concept of “terroir,” the “entire local environment from which a particular food comes.”
While she was talking we were served two cheese in the “bloomy rinds” category, which includes brie types with a minimum of 30 percent butterfat content, double cremes with a minimum of 60 percent butterfat content, and triple cremes with a minimum of 70 percent or higher butterfat content. Nebinger had selected two. One was a brie-type cheese in style of a Coulommiers from France, an award-winning cheese from a sustainable dairy farm in Vermont. Nebinger describes this as a cheese with a “forthright meaty and mushroomy fragrance and taste” with a minimum of 40 percent butterfat content.
All That And Healthy, Too?
Next to that was a generous slice of a perfectly ripe and runny Delice de Bourgogne, a favorite of the cheese shop’s customers. “When ripe, Delice de Bourgogone resembles a pile of whipped cream wedged between aged crackle curling parchment,” Nebinger said. She claims it is actually a healthy food, rich in omega-3 fatty acids. Moreover, it is the product of grass-fed cattle, which produce less greenhouse gases.
Nebinger invited us to try them and both were fabulous. The Coulommier-style brie was served with a Williams pear confit with white wine, and the Delice with a raspberry peach champagne jam.
And so it went through an 8 Month Aged Raw Milk Curado Manchego made from sheep’s milk (“a buttery lacey texture”) served with Membrillo quince paste and Marcona almonds; a Pecorino Toscano Stagionato, a “famous aged sheep’s milk cheese from the Tuscany region in Italy,” with a “distinct flavor of olives and grass with a nutty aftertaste,” served with French mixed olives, Italian olive oil, and bread; and Flory’s Farm Truckle, an artisanal cheese from Missouri that, while not particularly sharp, has a “butterscotchy nuanced grass complexity.”
About That Baby
While we were tasting all of these cheeses, I’d like to point out, six month-old Syrus Gish from Portland was alternately cheerful and seemingly attentive. It turns out this was his second cheese tasting. His mother, Heather, and father, Marcus, who were sitting at a table for two a little off to the side, juggled him back and forth.
Nebinger then started to talk about one of the shining stars of the cheese show that evening, the Old Quebec Seven Year Aged Vintage Cheddar, a cheese of consistently high quality that is “creamy, crunchy, crumbly, and crystalline, with a super sharp bite,” Nebinger said. The cheese, cut up into tiny cubes, almost a small dice, due to the intensity of the taste, was served with spicy beer biscuits and Edmund Fallot French Dijon mustard.
I listened to Nebinger, but watched the Gish family as little Syrus happily bounced in daddy’s arms. All of the sudden, Syrus let out a huge belch and clapped his hands and kicked his feet.
“Don’t pretend like that wasn’t you,” Hafford said to me.
We all laughed, and I continued to watch the Gish family. Mom was popping a bit of something in baby’s mouth. Baby would clap his hands and kick his feet. Mom popped something else in baby’s mouth. Again, the hand clapping and feet kicking. Lots of bouncing.
“Does anyone have any questions?” Nebinger asked.
“Yes,” I said. “I want to know what that baby is eating.”
Heather Gish laughed and said he was eating a bit of the Seven Year Quebec.
A happy baby with a sophisticated palette. Now, that’s a good baby.
When it was all over, both Hafford and Crawford and several others said they enjoyed it and wouldn’t hesitate to attend another tasting.
“Absolutely,” said Hafford, who sometimes does cheese tastings at the inn, pairing them with his favorite beers. “There is so much to learn.”