Short update...

[telophase]

...on the food. :D The cheese, alas, was not a favorite. I keep trying to find a somewhat good-quality cheese that I like to eat better than plain old Albertson's store brand Monterey Jack. There pretty much is none: I am a cheese Philistine.

The butter, OTOH, was wonderful. I'm not sure what brand it is, as I ripped the label off and it stuck to itself quite effectively and is now at the bottom of the trash can, but it's packed into a twee little straw basket and is French. I shall be eating a lot of plain old bread I think, in order to do justice to this butter. It will probably make popcorn taste wonderful. XD

Comments

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

I'm a total low class cheese lover. Have you tried Tillamook cheddar? The Costco has it and I used to get it when I lived in Portland (it's a Northwest brand, sort of Northwest grocery store level brand). Very tasty, creamy, mild. Mmmmm. Melts wonderfully well and makes the best nachos.

[chomiji]

I hear you on the cheese. Every year our friend Michael has a massively Gourmet New Year's Eve dinner, and it always includes a cheese course, and I usually only like maybe one of the half-dozen super speshul things he presents. I have found other things I like besides cheddar, but considering the amazing number of different types of cheese in the world, it's a really small group: fresh goat cheese, fresh mozzarella, "Drunken" goat cheese, Muenster, smoked Gouda, Manchego, Bel Paese, Cheshire, and Wensleydale - but the Wensleydale has to be nice and fresh. Just forget anything with mold on it ... ewww!

You might like Cheshire - it's like a dry cheddar.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Haven't tried it - I usually go for generic cheddar or cheddar jack. XD I'll look out for it.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

My parents were Cheese and Wine people when I was growing up, but it took me until the past 5-6 years to really get into wine. (Not that I drink it often enough to consider myself a wine person - I just like it a lot more now. XD)

I have deep and abiding bitterness over a wine cheddar that lived in the fridge for a while and made really nasty nachos that my parents claimed tasted just like regular nachos and I maintained tasted like wine. Ick.

[chomiji]

I'm still not real big on wine! I've learned that I like sweet white wines, and the respectable ones are typically German or Alsatian wines, like Gewürztraminer and Riesling. And that's about as far as I've come ... . The same New Year's event features a wine - or sometimes two - for every course, and he's pretty good at identifying things I'll like. But they're really hard to get by the glass in restaurants.

[cschells.livejournal.com]

My father-in-law (who is French and lives in France) makes a special trip to an out-of-town place in order to buy this particular butter that has grains of salt in it that you can practically crunch, and is otherwise and for reasons I can't quite enumerate simply the yummiest butter I can imagine. It's almost not butter it's so good... mmmm!

[telophase.livejournal.com]

I used to like only sweet white wines, but my palate inexplicably evolved and now I don't like white wine much, but love fruity red wines. My mother calls my taste in wine "fruit juice," however. XD

I know I like shiraz wines. :)

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Mmmmm, that sounds good! XD

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Heeee, those are my usual favorite poisons too! They work surprisingly well with spicy Asian dishes. And they inevitably make me giggle a little bit because there's a running bit in one of my more obscure fandoms about the typical color of the glass used in Moselle bottles.

...in fact, I think I'll go start on some Riesling right now.

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Oooh, that sounds good.

[lady-noremon.livejournal.com]

I've been depressed at the quality and taste of the cheese portions they usually have out during the holidays. They used to be very yummy and now they taste like plastic.

I like Farmers' brand cheeses & Cracker Barrel XD [and good soft cheese portions]

Sounds like some damn tasty butter :3 [I personally don't like regular butter, I prefer this brand of margarine that they don't sell anymore to my knowledge [Signal], but I use margarine instead of butter anyway...]

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

I used to think I really just didn't like reds very much. However, after sampling an extremely costly brunello, I've now figured out that I do like reds, but only ones that I can't afford. XD

[inkblot14.livejournal.com]

hie thyself over to a whole foods or central market, they got the spiffy cheeses. I'm partial to a Dublin White Cheddar, but it's a sharp flavor. I'll eat a bit on crackers or bread, but it's really awesome on omelets and such. For regular cheddars, there's a couple of Wisconsin kinds that are pretty spiff.

For butter, look for Sommerfield's English Butter (probably at central market). It's an english butter imported by some of the snobbier stores, and it's the best butter I know of. Kerrygold is good too, but Sommerfields takes toast to such heights!

Excuse me, I'm going to go make some toast now.

bink

[telophase.livejournal.com]

I was at Central Market. :)

I wish I could do tasting while I was there, but the lactose-intolerance thing makes that kind of difficult.

[madame-manga.livejournal.com]

French butter is made from cultured cream, which is a bit soured like yogurt. The sourness doesn't really carry over to the butterfat, but something about the maturing process apparently releases various flavor elements that make butter taste, well, more *buttery*. :D

http://www.travelerslunchbox.com/journal/2007/6/21/getting-some-culture.html

I tried making some cultured butter myself a few weeks ago, but although I inoculated my cream with yogurt as instructed, my kitchen just isn't warm enough for lactobacillus, and it just sat there for 48 hours. The butter was tasty anyway!

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Ooh, wow, I'll have to try that! :D

[madame-manga.livejournal.com]

It's even faster with a food processor than with a mixer, BTW. And fun! :)

I used something called "manufacturing cream", which is meant for bakeries and restaurants and has more butterfat than most cream you can get at the grocery store. It only comes in half-gallons and larger, but when you're making butter, that's not a problem! There's a chain called Smart and Final that carries manufacturing cream here, or you may be able to find it at warehouse stores or other places that cater to food service. Otherwise, try to find cream that's pasteurized as opposed to ULTRA-pasteurized, and says nothing on the ingredient label other than "cream".

But no matter what kind of cream you use, homemade butter is much tastier than storebought. I gotta make another batch...