Culture Magazine Debut + Birchrun Dinner

Alas, it’s here: the winter issue of Culture Magazine. It features my first story for the magazine, and I’m so pleased that it brings attention to a stellar blue-cheese maker from Pennsylvania, Sue Miller of Birchrun Hills Farm.

I interviewed Sue this fall and spent a day watching her make Birchrun Blue. Her attention to detail and her deep love of all things Holstein showed me something important that goes into cheesemaking besides milk and rennet: devotion. Deep, deep devotion to animals, land, and the people Sue calls her "eaters".

This issue of Culture feels like an album of greatest hits for me. The centerfold cheese is Rush Creek, from Uplands Cheese in my home state of Wisconsin. And the spread right after my story on Sue showcases Mike Geno’s cheese portraits (yup, that's one on the wall in the photo below). Mike’s been featured on this site many times. In fact, he often accompanies me on fromage junkets around the city.

Birchrun Hills Farm Dinner: Coincidentally, Philadelphia’s own Southwark restaurant has planned to honor Sue Miller with a Birchrun Hills Farm tasting dinner on Wednesday, Dec. 21, at 7 p.m. ($45). Chef Nick Macri has four incredible courses planned to feature Birchrun's cheese, whey-fed pork, and veal. Please join Mike Geno, Sue Miller, and me. Raw milk and cookies for dessert!

To reserve a spot at Southwark’s Birchrun Hills Dinner, call the restaurant at 215-238-1888.  

Cloven Gouda

Marieke Clove Gouda, painting by Mike Geno

I've had a recent obsession with clove-studded Gouda. I know, I know, it doesn't sound appealing. But around the holidays, this curious cheese is delicious alongside mulled cider. A few weeks ago, I invited our painter friend Mike Geno over to help me dismantle a Wisconsin-themed Thanksgiving cheese board I put together -- and by "dismantle," I mean devour.

Mike was struck by the appearance of this cheese, which looks like a hunk of marble full of rusty nails. He took it home to paint, one more in his series of luxurious cheese portraits that will appear in the winter issue of Culture Magazine. 

If you have a hankering to try this cheese, visit Holland's Family Cheese. This family-run dairy farm produces a variety of aged and flavored Goudas, and while I'm not usually a fan of gussied up cheeses, this one is both intriguing and balanced. It's made by Marieke and Rolf Penterman who moved from Holland to Wisconsin and are now producing award-winning cheese.

Cheese Portrait Retrospective

On Saturday, we set out the cheese. Each one had been painted. Mike Geno, the artist, had his own cheese board displayed in a studio off the back of his loft apartment.



The photo is a little dark, but you get the idea. Mike has spent the last several months in a Zen cheese zone.  On Fridays, he and I would walk to cheese shops across Philadelphia, in search of the most aesthetically pleasing wedges. He liked crags and texture, like this wedge of Strathdon Blue.

It's one of my favorites -- a Scottish beauty, full of beachy flavor. The cheesemaker, Ruaraidh (pronounced "Rory") Stone, makes this cheese in an old brewery right along the Scottish coast, and he claims you can taste the sea in his cheese. I think it's true.

Mike captured the beauty of cheese in his portrait series. When I look at wedge of Manchego now, I can't help but study the rind.



Even Mimolette, with its moonscape exterior and annatto-tinged interior -- so waxy and weird -- has become more intriguing.



We had a lot of fun showing people how to see (and taste) cheese in new ways at our secret studio tour. Lots of you showed up in your Saturday best, matching red shirts and all.



Kisha, you even brought your cheese journal. Splendid.



There were other notables, like Albert of Messy & Picky fame, who works at the Fair Food Farmstand. He was the first cheesemonger I ever met when I started in on this fairytale. (After the party was over, he gave us a demo on how to wrap cheese like a professional.)



Debbie and Fred from Amazing Acres showed up to view "Sea Smoke," a cheese they used to make. Ahhh, Sea Smoke.



It was fun to watch people's reactions as they nibbled cheese, then went to view it in the studio.



Along with all of Mike's tchotchkes.



And bacon-colored pastels.



And life-like bacon stills.



Here we are, at the end of a happy day.



Mike's cheese portraits will soon be on display at Cakespy in Seattle. If you want a preview, visit his flickr gallery. You can always find Mike at mikegeno.com.