Now that’s a cheese plate!
Brindille offers thirteen varieties of French cheese arrayed in a neat circle, with meltingly sweet baked apple in the middle. Starting at 12 o’clock, they proceed roughly in order from mild to intense:
- Chevre d’Argental – Rhone-Alps
- Blanc Bleu Tombor – Pays de la Loire
- Sainte-Maure de Touraine – Centre
- Sainte Nectaire – Auvergne
- Petit Basque – Pyrénées
- Crémeux de Bourgogne – Burgundy
- Brillat Savarin – Normandy
- Camembert – Normandy
- Munster – Alsace
- Preferes de Montagnes – Rhone-Alps
- Fium Orbu de Brebis – Corsica
- Comte Saint Antoine – Jura
- Roquefort AOC – Carles
Each piece is a bite or two presented at the perfect temperature – just enough to contemplate and compare taste and texture, in a sort of tour de fromage.Some of my favorites were the old creamy standbys, Cremeux de Bourgogne, Brillat Savarin, and Camembert.
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the Munster, which was quite sophisticated – nothing like the deli case cheese the name conjures.
And I especially liked a cheese I’d never heard of before, the Corsican Fium Orbu de Brebis, which is slightly firm and complexly flavored.
Get a glass of red wine and study up – it’s a cheesy crash course!
Schwa – fact or fiction?
Next: elBulli
Baked French toast
Tempura Uchitsu, Tokyo