The Teddington Cheese Wire Issue 9

Issue no 9 December 1999/January 2000
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Wishing you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

And to celebrate the Millennium:

The Millennium Cheese Selection
Now you can have your very own Dome with the The Millennium Cheese Selection:

Photograph of the Millennium cheese selection

The Millennium Cheese Selection
ONLY £39.95
inc vat and overnight delivery
(to UK addresses only)
OFFER NOW OVER
Please see our home page for current offers

Colston Bassett Shropshire Blue, Pecorino Toscano, Green's Cheddar, a Valençay, a Trami d'Alsace, a Camembert au Calvados and a Gaperon .

Total weight of cheese 1.4 Kg.

Orders will be despatched on Weds 29th Dec to be delivered on Thurs 30th Dec (Somebody must be in to receive the cheese and orders cannot be left without a signature). Alternatively you can order our Millennium Cheese Selection with your Christmas cheeses. The individual cheeses will be semi-mature when despatched and will mature during the Christmas period to be ready for the Millennium celebrations.

Drawing of a mouse on a cheese wire

Inside

Features
Ordering for Christmas and the New Year

Cheese Focus
Gaperon
Chaource

Farm Focus
Feeding animals during the cold winter

Tools of the Trade
The Cheese Piercer

Competition
Celebrity Cheese
Answers to Wordsearch competition

Christmas and New Year Opening Hours

Usual opening hours until 23rd December (Mon to Sat 9.30am to 6pm)

Friday 24th Dec
9.30am to 4pm
Saturday 25th to 28th Dec
Closed
Wednesday 29th Dec
9.30am to 6pm
Thursday 30th Dec
9.30am to 6pm
Friday 31 Dec to 3
Jan Closed
Tuesday 4th Jan
Open as usual

ORDERS FOR CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR

ARE NOW BEING TAKEN

The majority of farms that we deal with are small and, in the interest of quality, they use only the milk from their own animals. Unfortunately, the farmers are unable to persuade their animals to produce more milk just because it's Christmas. On the contrary, milk yields of sheep and goats fall dramatically in the winter and return to normal after they have had their lambs and kids in the spring.

All our cheese orders were placed with the farms many months ago. We cannot order more at the last minute since the farms will have no more to sell. Soft cheeses require particular care. They are matured ready for sale at Christmas and the New Year and we hope only to have small amount remaining by the end of each. With thirty different soft cheeses we can only estimate the amount we will need of each.

It is inevitable that many of our cheeses are going to sell out and you may not have your favourites on the Christmas table or for your millennium celebrations. Please can you take the time to place your orders by Friday 10th December for both Christmas and the New Year. Orders received after this date can only be accepted if we still have the capacity.

COMPETITON

Celebrity cheese

'Gorgonzola is the Pavarotti of cheese. Soft, heavy and creamy it bulges out just managing to hold together, and sings out on the palette' Who does your favourite cheese remind you of and why?
Competition now over
See issue 10 for details of the winning entry

All entries must be received by 15th January 2000 (please include your name, address and telephone number). The winner will receive a Gladstone hamper. Entries will be accepted by post or e-mail. The winner of the last competition was Lesley Jillings of Chelmsford with sixteen correct answers. Thank you to everyone who entered our competition.

Drawign of long grasses

Feeding farm animals during the cold winter

The optimum diet for a particular animal will differ for each breed and type of animal. Grass forms the main part of their diet and it is readily available in the spring and summer months.

Drawing of long grasses

But during the winter months farmers have to rely on treated grass, root vegetables or cereal substitutes (a little bit like muesli). They have the choice of buying in what is required or growing it themselves. The price of winter feed varies dramatically depending on the quantities available.

To make hay a farmer will keep his animals out of certain fields during the spring and early summer, which allows a deep carpet of grass to grow. The grass is mown and given four sunny days allowed to dry. During that time the grass is turned over to get even drying throughout and then the hay is baled.

More commonly in this country where the weather cannot be relied on, silage is made. As with hay the grass is allowed to grow and then cut. It is baled and pickled on the following day and then stored in an airtight bag. This process is like picklingonions; if the silage is left open to the air it will

lose its goodness. Silage can also be made from unripe cereal crops like oats and barley, which is known as arable silage.

In addition, the farmer can grow root vegetables such as turnips, parsnips and kale. These crops grow well in autumn ready for harvesting in the winter. Rather than digging up the root vegetable and storing them until they are required, the animals can eat their way across the field - both the green foliage and the root are eaten.

The diet for milking animals invariably includes 'cake' or cereal substitute, which is a combination of cereal products and molasses to hold it all together in a pellet form. The best time to feed this is during milking as the animals are preoccupied eating rather than kicking the milkman or other animals. The amount fed to animals can be increased in the winter months.

Drawing of root vegetables

Top illustration: A balanced pasture containing Meadow fescue, Perennial Rye-grass, Cosksfoot, Timothy, Italian Rye-grass, Burnet, Lucerne, Red clover and Ribwort.

Left (from left to right): Cow cabbage, Kohl-rabi, Kale.

Tools of the Trade

Photograph of a cheese piercer

The Cheese Piercer

Have you ever wondered how they get the 'blue' into the cheese? Originally blueing of a cheese was a result of mould spores found naturally in the atmosphere working their way into the cheese through minute gaps between the curds - the cheeses were only lightly pressed (or not pressed at all) in order to preserve these small air inclusions. Many cheeses such as Roquefort in France and Picos Blue in Spain are ripened in caves where the mould spores thrive.

Photograph of Roquefort

Roquefort above, Picos blue above right

Photograph of Picos Blue

Nowadays blue cheeses are inoculated with the blue-forming bacteria during production. The type of bacteria depends on the flavour required. For instance Roquefort is inoculated with Penicillium roquefortii, Gorgonzola with Penicillium gorgonzola and Danish Mycella with Penicillium mycellum. The blueing process is then accelerated by introducing air by piercing the cheese with stainless steel needles.

There are several designs of piercing machine. The one shown here is used in the making of Danish Blue. Machines used to pierce taller cheeses such as Stilton consist of a turntable onto which the cheese is placed. The cheese is then rotated and a set of needles pierce the sides as it is rotated. Needles also pierce the top and bottom of the cheese

Photograph of a Chaource cheese

Chaource
Champagne, France

Chaource takes its name from the market town of Chaource, thirty kilometres south of Troyes, and it has been made since the 14th century. It is said that Marguerite de Bourgogne demanded it at her table and that Charles le Bel took great pleasure in tasting it when travelling through the region. Local farmers took their cheese to the great international Champagne fairs in Troyes, earning them a much needed income.

The paste has a delicate nutty flavour and a creamy texture which melts in the mouth, and a white fluffy coat. The cheese becomes very creamy, almost liquid as it ages. The best cheeses are made from April to May when the new grass is emerging but good cheese can still be produced throughout the year.

Chaource gained its A.O.C. status on 19th August 1970. It is made from unpasteurised cows' milk. Our Chaource is hand ladled the traditional way which preserves its light and delicate curd It is generally matured from 2 weeks to 1 month but can be kept for upto two months in humid cellars. Cheeses measure 150mm in diameter and 60mm in depth. Each cheese weighs approximately 500g and has a fat content of 50%.

Chaource can be enjoyed with Chablis, Nuit Saint Georges, Sancerre or Champagne Rose.

Cheese Focus Cheese Focus Cheese Focus

Photograph of Gaperon

Gaperon
Haute Auvergne, France

Gaperon is a small cheese flavoured with pepper and garlic. It has a white fluffy coat and is shaped into a dome which looks like a tiny igloo. Originating in the region of the pink garlic of the Limagne plain, in the Haute Auvegrne, Gaperon has been made and enjoyed for centuries.

Milk which is left over in the churn after butter-making is mixed with fresh milk to make the cheese curds. The curds are then mixed with the local pink garlic and pepper. Since buttermilk is used, the resulting cheese is slightly lower in fat, generally 35%. The origin of the name 'Gaperon' is taken from the local French dialect for buttermilk which is 'gap' or 'gape'.

Over the centuries Gaperons were hung in the farmhouse kitchen or the storeroom. The number of cheeses gave an indication as to the farmer's wealth and as such would have an influence on the marriage of his daughters. Cheeses were sometimes tied with yellow ribbons and offered as wedding gifts or harvest symbols, a decoration still in use today. Stored in the farmhouse the white coat would acquire a mottled colour of grey and blue as the spores in the air found their way onto the surface of the cheese

Our Gaperon is made using the same ancient methods and the cheese will taste very similar to the ones enjoyed by the ploughmen and dairymaids of the 14th Century. They are no longer matured in the farmhouse kitchen but on rye straw in a damp cellar for one to two months. Each cheese measures 75mm in diameter, 75mm in height and weighs approximately 300 grammes. Gaperon is available all year round with no particular best season, principally because of the pepper and garlic flavouring. Gaperon is best enjoyed with a full-bodied red such as a CÙtes du Rhone.

ANSWERS TO THE WORDSEARCH COMPETITION

The wordsearch contains the names of twenty-one cheeses; fifteen cheeses which we stock at our shops together with six more unusual cheeses which one day we hope to feature as 'Cheese of the Week'.

Answers across

M	U	N	S	T	E	R	B	P
A	R	O	O	S	B	A	R	I	L	C
N	D	G	A	D	R	C	A	C	A	H
C	A	R	S	T	I	L	T	O	N	E
H	G	U	B	B	E	E	N	D	G	S
E		Y		F	E	T	A	O	R	H
G	J	E	T	O	S	T		N	E	I
O	U	R	D	E	R	E			S	R
G	I	E	N	T	O	M	E	T	T	E
S	A	I	N	T	M	A	R	C	E	L

Answers down

M	U	N	S	T	E	R	B	P
A	R	O	O	S	B	A	R	I	L	C
N	D	G	A	D	R	C	A	C	A	H
C	A	R	S	T	I	L	T	O	N	E
H	G	U	B	B	E	E	N	D	G	S
E		Y		F	E	T	A	O	R	H
G	J	E	T	O	S	T		N	E	I
O	U	R	D	E	R	E			S	R
G	I	E	N	T	O	M	E	T	T	E
S	A	I	N	T	M	A	R	C	E	L

The fifteen cheeses we stock at our shops are:

Brie, Cheshire, Esrom, Feta, Gjetost, Gruyere, Gubbeen, Langres, Manchego, Munster, Picodon, Raclette, Saint Marcel, Stilton and Tomette.

The six more unusual cheeses are:

Bra - An Italian cheese from Piedmont. A dense, strong, salty, cow's milk cheese with a thick light brown rind. Not for faint hearts.
Gad - A springy, yellow, loaf-shaped, cows' milk cheese with scattered small holes. Made in Israel.
Gien - From Orléanais, France this is a cows' (or cow blended with goat) milk cheese which is matured for a month to give a pronounced nutty flavour. It is often wrapped in a Chestnut leaf.
Ourde - Similar to the famous 'Pyrénées' ewes' milk cheese but made outside the strict AOC boundaries and so cannot carry the name. Instead the name of the village in which it is made is used.
Roos - A strong, salty cheese made with goats' or ewes' milk in Iraq. It is molded and pressed by hand into grapefruit-sized balls and ripened for six months.
Urda - A soft, whey cheese eaten with herbs as a spread or used in cooking. Made in Czechoslovakia and parts of the former Yugoslavia.

Our new brochure is now available.

Our new brochure is now out and includes many more products and much more information.

Cheese selections - Each cheese monger has put together a balanced cheese selection which includes some of their favourites.

Cheese List - The cheese list now includes a photograph of each cheese, provides discounts for whole cheeses and indicates which cheeses can be sent worldwide.

Hampers - A new and wider range of hampers and the opportunity to design your own using any of the products in the brochure.

Wine and cheese accessories - now stocked in our larger Kew shop. All are available by mail order and for collection from Teddington.

If you need any help or advise then please do not hesitate to telephone us on 0208 940 1944

Photgraph of baskets available for mail order hampers

All articles © www.teddingtoncheese.co.uk