say cheese!

Im unhappy with my camera right now which seems to be overexposing...consequently, until it goes on a visit to Nikon, there will be no pics posted.

Anyhoo...

Alex and I went to an interesting event last weekend that could be smelled from the hallway of the Hilton outside the ballroom even with the doors shut.

peaked your interest?

I found out about the American Cheese Society last June when on a quest to find the best blue cheese made for my dad for fathers day, as he loves blue cheese and buys everything he'd want for himself--leaving gift giving to be creative for his loved ones...so I found Roque Creamery blue cheese and had their gourmet basket shipped to him because I discovered it was awarded several blue ribbons at last year's cheese festival which was somewhere like San Francisco and had the top cheese experts from the world as judges.

So, during this quest, I also discovered the ACS cheese judging would be, for the first time, here in Austin this year.

They have a convention for cheese makers and artisans for a few days and then the judging and that's all closed to the public...but then after the judging is over, for 75 benjamins you can get a ticket to go in and taste, with complimentary wine and sides, every cheese of every kind entered into the competition.

There were about 2,000 different kinds of cheese.

That ballroom will smell like cheese for weeks.

There was vanilla goat cheese, there was cheese with lavendar flowers and other beautiful flowers in it, there was mozzarella in all kinds of oils, there was chipotle cheddar, there were mixtures like jack cheese and flavored goat cheese, there were names like "old goat creamery cheese", there was black truffel cheese, and good ideas such as a WONDERFUL goat cheese rolled in cranberries which was not only beautiful but delish...and I will be recreating that one during the holidays.

And tons of crackers, breads, foccacia, chocolates, olives yada yada yada to go with.

The cheeses were judged in each category such as flavored goat cheese, regular goat cheese, cheddars, blue cheeses, yogurt, butter, whatever...

then they had a table with the best of show cheeses.

I many, many of them went in my belly.

The funny thing was to be surrounded by people who literally fly in each year to this event who are cheese snobs and say things like "I must say I am surprised that this one got second place and I find the notes all over the place. Do you find that the depth isn't what you'd expect and that it is uncanny in it's overtures?" or whatever. They made me laugh. Just eat the cheese. Top your cheese with some cheese topping and hush. Cheese is good.

The next day, on Sunday, they put the cheeses brought for sale to the public for a steep discount of what they'd cost in the gourmet specialty stores. They don't want to fly home with cheese after cartin' it all here, dontchaknow.

but we skipped that event. I didn't want to look at cheese for a week after the night before.

p.s. I did my research well. Guess who one the best of show as the best cheese overall out of ALL cheeses in ALL categories?

Roque Creamery blue cheese.
The one I bought my daddy for dad's day.
Last year they won Best Blue cheese but this year they took home the big one.

**pats self on back**

I will add it made us decide to do a cheese night on our BRAND NEW ENORMOUS BACKYARD DECK WE JUST HAD BUILT AND LOVE once a week for dinner.

and we'll discuss the tonality, depth and overtures while lookin' at the trees and surrounded by doggies at our feet. I kid on the discussion...we'll be too busy eatin'.