What Did I Have For Lunch Today?

Can you remember 100 different things you had to eat during the previous 330-ish days? We sure as hell can’t. A PB&J would certainly be in there. A few dozen or so cheeses (at least) and some onion and Comte soup. Damn. That only puts us at about 39 at the most. 100? Are you friggin’ kidding us? Welp, the folk over at Time Out Chicago were clearly using their notebooks while dining out this year, and we’re glad they did. They put together a wonderful list of “The Best Things We Ate in 2008” … and along with all the other tasty snacks mentioned by the TOC editors, our classic Cheese Puffs graced the list. And as such, we of course had to throw those crazy fried balls of cheese back on our menu.

Cheese Caves

We just found this video of Willi Lehner giving a tour of his homemade cheese cave up at Bleu Mont Dairy in Blue Mound, WI. It’s kinda hilarious really. During the first two seconds of this clip, you imagine the scene is set in Ancient Egypt or something. Then there’s Willi, ready to run down some details of cheese cave creation. His cheese is pretty friggin’ amazing … it’s taken home some ACS prizes over the past few years, and we’re always stoked when we get some of his bandaged cheddar in the mail. The folk over at Cheese By Hand also did a cool feature on Willi and his family about two years ago as they were building the cave. You can get a better sense of the design from this photo here. Fun stuff.

P.S. Our apologies for taking an off-week (or two) from the old blogosphere. Tis the holiday season and we’ve been a bit swamped.

Spreading Holiday Beer

It’s time for our December Beer-of-the-Month Club, and that (of course) means spreading around some holiday and winter-release beers. Now we normally compile a mixture of 12 different beers for those with BOM Memberships. However, we came across this amazing holiday beer from Brouwerij Corsendonk …their Christmas Ale. Thus, we decided to offer up eight bottles of Corsendonk and then pick out four of our favorite winter-release beers from domestic craft breweries.

Here’s the loot for December. Let us know what you think:

Corsendonk Christmas Ale: Brouwerij Corsendonk, Belgium, Belgian Strong Dark Ale, 8.5% abv.

Avery Old Jubilation: Avery Brewing Company, Boulder, CO, English Strong Ale or Winter Warmer, 8% abv.

Anderson Valley Winter Solstice: Anderson Valley Brewing Company, Boonville, CA, Winter Warmer, 6.9% abv.

Great Lakes Christmas Ale: Great Lakes Brewing Co., Cleveland, OH, Winter Warmer, 7.5% abv.

Lagunitas Brown Shugga’: Lagunitas Brewing Co., Petaluma, CA, American Strong Ale, 9.9% abv.

Bartlett Blue

I just ate an amazing piece of Bartlett Blue from Jasper Hill Farms in Vermont. Wow, what an awesome cheese! Rich in flavor and fudgey in texture. Mmmmm. I suggest y’all run out and get some today.
-rc

You’ve Made It, Chicago

After some prodding from Chicagoland beer enthusiasts, BeerAdvocate.com (arguably the leading online forum for all things craft beer) has added a forum group strictly for our fair city. Before then, it was just Boston and New York that held this high honor, but as of last week we can now start talking Chicago beer without fear of New Englanders or Floridians butting in with their two cents. On the whole, BeerAdvocate is a pretty solid site (and now magazine) worth checking out. We’ve even been reviewed in recent months.

Grape of the Moment!

Hello Goodfolk,

December 1st. More snow on the ground than this Alabama girl has ever seen. Coldness. Christmas music. I need a remedy and fast. I think I’ll think about shellfish and Albariño so much so that now I want to write about the grape Albariño.

It’s a tricky grape to grow, this one. Albariño or Alvarinho as the Portuguese might say, is grown predominantly in Galicia (northwestern Spain) and northwestern Portugal’s Vinho Verde DOC. These geographic areas are called, at least in Spain, la costa de la muerte- the death coast. Tangential fact: There are more shipwrecks here than anywhere else in the world. Nice.

So while the Albariño grape is relatively productive, its skin is so darn thick that the juice yields are low. I’m sure that is irritating for the growers, but it’s good for us; the resulting wines have incredibly rich, concentrated flavors of peach, apricots, and citrus. Don’t let the light pale straw-yellow color fool you; on the palette, Albariño is viscous and creamy, medium to full-bodied, wickedly flavorful, and supported by good acidity and seawater-esque minerality. Perhaps it is that close-to-the-sea trait that makes this wine tremendously righteous for anything that comes out of the ocean.

Come to think of it, thinking about eating mussels and octopus and drinking Albariño did not in fact bring to mind warmer temperatures. After all, it’s cold and windy in Galicia and it’s still cold here in Chicago. I am comforted, though, because there are bottles of Albariño close by and that in itself is a warm and fuzzy thought.

Salud,

-Candy, winemonger

My Cheese Is Cold

We noted this nice post on a pretty cool cheese blog the other day. I don’t believe us Midwesterners can quite yet pick up this line of frozen, cheese-infused dishes, but I’m certainly intrigued by their potential quality. I won’t pretend that the concept of these items doesn’t scare me a little. The idea of taking cheese as wonderful as Rogue Smokey Blue, Beecher’s Flagship Reserve and Humbolt Fog, and then tossing them in a frozen food case makes me cringe, and then scratch my head. Tami Parr gave them a somewhat favorable review, but the idea seems to completely contradict the general moral code that I thought each of these companies upheld. What do you think? Was the opportunity to get their cheese in supermarkets too lucrative to pass up for Rogue and Cypress Grove? Should we be happy for these cheesemakers who are spreading their product to larger markets? Or does this move “de-value” the brand of some wonderful artisan cheesemakers?

Thanksgiving Wine Basics, Part II.a

It’s Winesday! Continuing fun-ed day!

The traditional American Thanksgiving meal is a train wreck of flavors—to put it gently. I’m from the deep south, so we stuff our fowl with oyster dressing; put marshmallows, pecans and/or brown sugar on our sweet potatoes; cook our green beans beyond recognition; and then cover all of that, which is—wrongly—on the same plate, with giblet gravy. Not to mention the sweet/tart cranberry sauce we eat too much of on the turkey and the oyster dressing.

So what poor wine could possibly be expected to handle all that?

I think I’ll have to go back to last week’s advice, specifically #2: If you like the wine you are drinking with what you are eating, then it goes.

Have fun and enjoy being with your loved ones. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone,

-candy, winemonger

Chef Pivoney Carves a Turkey

I’m picturing Chevy Chase carving that slightly dried-out turkey in the holiday classic Christmas Vacation. The reality, of course, is that carving a turkey at the dinner table with nothing under it but a platter is completely friggin’ insane. Chef Pivoney recently shared some turkey carving tips with the local news folk, and his approach seems effective, easy and realistic. And if at noon this Thursday you realize that you’ve somehow forgotten to place your bird in the oven … you may want to check out this video.

Culture Looks Pretty

Some friends have been pouring their entire lives into this new cheese-centric magazine, Culture. After months of hardwork on their part, the thing has been printed, bound, and is now sitting atop the cheese counter at our shop … and it looks friggin’ beautiful. We’d reccommend you stop in a pick up an issue, or sign up for a subscription, or check out a PDF of their spread about Winnimere. This is a magazine that needed to be made, and we’re awfully darn proud of the people who have made this happen.