Tag: washington cheese

  • CSAs: A New Way to Get Cheesy

    CSAs: A New Way to Get Cheesy

    Step aside, grocery stores and online shopping. The CSA is here! You may already be familiar with the acronym CSA as it relates to fruits and vegetables. CSA stands for “Community Supported Agriculture,” and it is a way for folks to buy shares of a local farm’s harvest. Think of it as everyday people helping…

  • Happy New Year!

    Happy New Year!

    Happy 2021, faithful readers! You may have noticed that I didn’t post very often in 2020 (although I do hope you didn’t notice), and I certainly wrote many more posts than I actually published. I’ll blame that on pandemic-related anxiety; I know I wasn’t the only person who felt 2020 was a tough year. 2020…

  • Tasting Notes: Métier Brewing Company Beers and Cheese

    Tasting Notes: Métier Brewing Company Beers and Cheese

    This year has wrought its share of terrible things, but one bright spot in the darkness is the beautiful foods that are still being produced for us to enjoy. Just as animals don’t stop producing milk, plants don’t stop growing and people don’t cease needing to eat—even when lives are threatened by a pandemic, social…

  • How Small Creameries Hang in the Balance of Quarantine and Coronavirus

    How Small Creameries Hang in the Balance of Quarantine and Coronavirus

    (with Links to Support Local Producers) It was a drizzly Friday afternoon in mid-March when Lynn Swanson received the call that Seattle’s farmers markets were closing. Lynn was distraught about the news for good reason: she makes sheep’s milk cheeses on the farmstead creamery that she and her husband own on about 80 acres of…

  • A Wisconsin Cheese Journey: Part 2

    A Wisconsin Cheese Journey: Part 2

    [This is a continuation of a three-part series on the Cheesemonger Invitational Winners’ trip to Wisconsin in October. You can read the first part here.] After two nights in Madison, I found myself charmed by Wisconsin. The landscape was not as boring as I imagined it would be, the people were friendlier and more open…

  • Fantello Farmstead Creamery: A New Washington Cheesemaker to Know

    Fantello Farmstead Creamery: A New Washington Cheesemaker to Know

    It was a grayish, early spring day in western Washington when I set out to spend my day off doing what I do best: getting cheesy. I drove from my home in Federal Way through the town of Auburn and into an agricultural area beyond that I had never before explored. The space between Auburn…

  • The Non-Melting Cheese That Should Be a Staple in Your Kitchen

    The Non-Melting Cheese That Should Be a Staple in Your Kitchen

    One of my favorite cheese puns is a joke about Halloumi: “What does cheese say when it looks in the mirror?” “Hallou-mi!” I’m not just a fan of this pun because it teaches you how to pronounce the name of a cheese that is obviously sassy and feeling itself, but also because it is about…

  • Lost Peacock Creamery: From #ThatFarmLife to Fabulous Farmstead Cheese

    Lost Peacock Creamery: From #ThatFarmLife to Fabulous Farmstead Cheese

    In a recent post, I briefly explained the difference between artisanal and industrial cheeses. But among artisanal cheeses, there are also differences. There are cheeses that boast of being ‘farmstead’ cheeses, and there are those that are simply ‘artisan’ or ‘specialty.’ Artisan cheeses should be made by hand, or with as little help as possible…

  • How Blue Cheese is Made at Twin Sisters Creamery

    How Blue Cheese is Made at Twin Sisters Creamery

    Looking at a wedge of blue cheese with lines of blue mold rippling through it, you might assume that the mold got there by being injected into the cheese. I have heard this from time to time as an explanation to children or from one adult to another, of how this family of cheeses is…

  • What It’s Like Competing in the Cheesemonger Olympics

    What It’s Like Competing in the Cheesemonger Olympics

    Last month, on January 13 and 14, I competed in the olympics of cheesemongering. If you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, you may have seen posts about the Cheesemonger Invitational (#cmisf). The invitational usually happens twice a year, during the Fancy Food Show. The winter edition is in San Francisco in January, and the…

  • What do you ask a cheesemonger?

    What do you ask a cheesemonger?

    “Where’s your bathroom?” – That’s the No. 1 question I answer all day, every day at work. Despite the mundaneness of turning people back to the front of the store from whence they came, it is but one of many questions a cheesemonger anticipates every day. Often times, people walk right up to you with…

  • What is the Difference Between Chèvre and Goat Cheese?

    What is the Difference Between Chèvre and Goat Cheese?

    “Where’s your goat cheese?” I answer this question at least three times a day at work; my response is usually not immediately helpful to the person asking. “Here is our goat cheese section in the cheese case, and over here we have two shelves of goat cheese on this wall. Is there a specific type…

  • The Cheeses Every Home Must Have

    The Cheeses Every Home Must Have

    This has been a big year for The PhCheese so far. Not on the blog front so much, unfortunately, but in more personal arenas. Things have been rather silent on the blog and social media because my fiancé and I succeeded in doing something we felt would be impossible in the Seattle metro area—and yet…

  • Celilo is Here!

    Celilo is Here!

    This weekend, an older couple came into the shop looking for Death & Taxes. While I knew exactly what cheese they wanted, I had to report that we did not carry it; in fact, I do not know of a shop in Seattle that does (please let me know if I’m wrong, people!). At that…

  • Finding the ‘Taste of Place’ in Cascadia Creamery’s Cheese

    Finding the ‘Taste of Place’ in Cascadia Creamery’s Cheese

    This is a story about some of Washington state’s finest cheeses and the fairytale-perfect land where they are made. If you drive south on Interstate 5 from Seattle until you cross the Columbia River into Oregon, take Highway 84 East at Portland. The highway meanders along the south bank of the river, treating you to…