Cheeseplates

Proof -- that beer goes well with cheese

We had the six course tasting menu at Proof last night (every bit delicious by the way) with two of the three of us agreeing to the course by course wine pairing as well. When the cheese course arrived however, they paired it with a Belgian style white ale (a Foret for those of you interested). 

Now I for one can't stand Belgian white beers.  Upon my first introduction to Hoegaarden in grad school, someone had the unfortunate precision to assert that "this beer tastes like dirty socks," and I just couldn't drink it after that. Regardless, I was delighted to find that a restaurant respected for its wine and cheese had put forward a beer pairing! While wine is the go to beverage for cheese, I think it can really cover up some of the beautiful cheese aftertaste or alter the initial flavor of a cheese hitting your mouth.  Not beer -- beer is mellow and it doesn't mind playing second fiddle to an awesome wedge of cheese. My friend tells me this is becoming a trend (beer-cheese pairings), which is certainly fine by me!

The cheese course at proof included a rather calm Gorgonzola and a robust sheep/cow hard cheese called Mona.  The latter was nutty and delicious with the raw honey served along side.

P.S. Apologies that my cheese plate consumption took such a nose dive over the last few months. The whole pregnancy=no unpasteurized cheese thing kind of takes the magic out of ordering whim-motivated cheese place and seeing what turns up. 

Zola (kitchen lends a hand)

Ok, so one of the 8 million things that pregnant women are supposed to avoid is unpasteurized cheese.  Luckily, the US government has such stringent pasteurization laws that any cheese produced on an industrial scale is totally fine.  Problem is, most restaurants rely on delicious boutique cheeses to concoct their cheese plate. What is a pregnant cheese lover to do??

Happily, Zola is also willing to poke around in their cheese pantry and pull together a pasteurized only cheese plate if you ask them to. They made no promises on the pairing, but when it arrived, it was just fine.  An aged goat, something kind of like manchego, and what may have been an Irish cheddar. Frankly, it would have been great with a beer, now that I think about it.  A handful of fruity goos to pair with it (maybe quince?  nothing was labeled or explained) and I couldn't complain.  Ok, I could complain since I had no idea what any of the cheeses actually were, but since their kitchen had taken the time to find the wrappers and determine which cheeses were pasteurized, I thought I'd let it go.

Bar Pilar

With our valiant New year's eve efforts to go ice-skating foiled, four of us found ourselves munching a cheese and meat plate from the choose-your-own-assortment at Bar Pillar. We went with:

• a Camembert
• a Mimolette, and
• an Irish-style Cheddar 

Somehow I am always surprised that Mimolette is an orange cheese.  Subconsciously, I suspect that I associate orange cheese with American kraft singles, and Mimolette just sounds so French.  It turns out, this was a cheese commissioned by Louis XIV, who wanted a cheese similar to Edam, but to make it sufficiently different, had it colored orange (see wikipedia if you don't believe me).  This cracks me up. In any case, it pairs nicely with Irish style cheddar (it has a very clean cheesy taste), and the plate at Bar Pillar had some sound accompaniments (french mustard, quince, etc).  As aways, I like the fact that you can build your own from the menu, even if they were light on descriptions.