CrankyCakes

I doubt I’ll ever get married again, but if I do it’s going to be to Cabot Clothbound Cheddar.

I picked some up on my last pass through the Northeast Kingdom, and have been sitting here eating it right down to its stinky rind, and then I ate the rind itself.  I didn’t want to keep going, but was compelled because I’ve been looking for the words to describe it.  Such is my commitment to food writing.

I agree with Formaggio Kitchen, which describes it as a “cow milk cheese that puts us at the table with the best cheddars of the world. It has a smooth firm texture and a sharp and fruity flavor with hints of caramel sweetness on the finish.”

And with Cowgirl Creamery, who says “sharp and creamy, this cheddar doesn’t so much melt in your mouth as it does coat every surface with caramelized luxury.”

Yup.  All those.  Luxurious, caramel, buttery, sharp, crumbly but sumptuous, perhaps a tiny bit nutty.  It’s just wonderful.

My friend Suzanne from Craftsbury, who seems to know where all the excellent food in the Northeast Kingdom is, told me about it.  How it’s made by Cabot and aged in the trés chic caves at Jasper Hill. She scrunched up her hands, showing me how they turn it and massage the cheese.  (When I asked a cheesemaker at the Burlington Farmers’ Market about turning and massaging cheese, he nodded and told me it was how they keep the cheese properly shaped, and the cheese mites – here’s a link to an image of one if you like to be grossed out – under control.)

Here’s what Cabot says about its creation:

“Cabot Clothbound Cheddar is a marvel of milk, master cheesemaking and artful aging,” said Cabot cheese maestro Marcel Gravel. Made one vat at a time, from the milk of purely Holstein cows, the result is a singular, Old World style cheddar. A special, proprietary blend of cheese cultures gives an unpasteurized note to this pasteurized milk cheddar.

“Traditional hooping and clothbound curds are just the beginning of this vanguard, Vermont collaboration. After creation, the wheels journey north along the Revolutionary War-era Bayley-Hazen Road into the care of Andy and Mateo Kehler, fellow Vermont cheesemakers and affineurs, and owners of The Cellars at Jasper Hill Farm. “Here, the cave-aged wheels benefit from spa-like pampering and controlled, mold-ripened maturing to develop their beautiful, natural rind,” said Mateo Kehler, co-owner of Jasper Hill Farm. “It’s all about spruce boards, hand turning and tender brushing. [They brush to get rid of the mites on clothbound cheeses.]

“The cheddar’s texture and flavor owe their balance and subtle tones equally to both parts of this dual team effort: traditional clothbound cheddar made at the historic creamery in Cabot and lovingly matured in Greensboro among the hills above Caspian Lake.”

Find some (I got mine at Greensboro’s Willey’s Store) and try it.  And then please bring me some more.  I promise not to complain if it doesn’t take out the trash or pick up its socks.

I was at a meeting with the committee that runs the Craftsbury Antiques & Uniques Festival fund raiser for work, when the talk turned (not unusually) to food.  Suzanne got a faraway look in her eye and started talking about Parker Pie in West Glover.

Parker Pie?  West Glover?

Yes, they assured me.  Parker Pie.  Delicious sandwiches, they said.  Amazing pizza, they said.  Specifically, Buffalo Chicken Pizza with Jasper Hill blue cheese.  Or any other of their thin-crusted pizzas.

So of course I asked if we could go there for our next meeting, and we planned our trip.

A little background on my life with pizza:  I grew up in the very Italian northern New Jersey town of Passaic.  Though there’s plenty to hate about Passaic, the pizza (like lots of the Italian food there) was cheap, widely available, and really, really good.

I didn’t know you actually could get bad pizza until I moved to Vermont in 1986.  I found it confusing.  Why would people make bad pizza?  Why would people eat it?

Of course, pizza has changed in the last 23 years.  Now we have really good stuff (my favorites are New York Pizza Oven for NY-style and American Flatbread for its sheer deliciousness).  But nothing else I’ve had in Vermont is as good as Parker Pie.  Thin-crusted, with a New York pizza’s light and chewy texture, cooked in a traditional pizza oven.  The sauce was good (I don’t know if it’s homemade) – not too sweet, and the right amount was in between the cheese and the crust.  We had to substitute feta for the blue cheese, which was just fine.

I have to admit that I was so excited about the food that it took me a few minutes to realize that this excellent stuff was being served in the back of the town’s general store.  They have a few tables and booths, a couple of bar stools at the bar, a laptop available to use, funky colors on the walls, and, when I was there, a show of local color photography.  It’s casual counter service, and you won’t hurry the staff, who are likely to be chatting with neighbors across the counter.  But don’t worry – they’ll be chatting with you when it’s your turn too because they’re really nice.  They’ve got 3 or 4 beers on tap, and wine, and you can grab a soda or iced tea from the store if you prefer.

It’s worth the trip.  But because I was unlikely to get there again too soon, I brought one home to share with the monkeyboys for dinner tonight.  Oh – and stopped at Greensboro’s Willey’s Store to get some of that blue cheese so I can taste the pizza as it was meant to be.  I can hardly wait.

Originally posted November 28,2008.

Here’s the deal: Thanksgiving makes me hate food.

I’m sorry. It’s curmudgeonly. But it’s true. I hate the annual festival of NPR announcers promising upcoming segments about new ways to cook the bird, the cranberries, ensure the stuffing is moist, combine unlikely pie ingredients, all of it. I do not want to learn more about cunning table decorations or place markers or how to put flowers into eviscerated squash.

I know this is a particularly privileged position. I’m a more than capable cook from a family of foodies who lives in a tight-knit community of excellent cooks. Our gatherings are convivial and delicious, and I’m usually lucky enough to have multiple invitations and friends to visit and eat with.

But do we have to all act like a bunch of stupid damn goldfish every year, pretending that we’ve forgotten what works and what doesn’t and that we’ve got to be the cleverest reinventers of everything autumnal?
Can’t we just eat the damn bird/seitan with the f’ing potatoes how we like them and the pie and the stuffing with whatever it is it’s supposed to have? Please?

That said, I’ll admit that Ruth Reichl knocked my socks off with her Pumpkin-Cheese Fondue in this year’s Gourmet, and so I attacked various squash and pumpkins left over from my CSA share and turned them into what my friend called “Cheese Bombs.”

But then again, she’s Ruth Reichl. Of course she knocks socks off. But the rest of ‘em aren’t and should just leave us alone.