Buffalo’s Milk

Bufala Quadrello

Made from pasteurized milk, Quadrello di Bufala (buffalo milk square) comes to us weighing about 5 pounds and is roughly the size and shape of Taleggio. This cheese has a seductive aroma, merging cave and mushroom scents with the frank fermentation smell of cultured milk. On the tongue, it is supple, creamy and coating, with plentiful salt and a vigorous tang. In Quadrello is everything one looks for in cheese: a compelling fragrance, a pleasing texture, flavor balance and a long finish. $15.95/lb

Cow’s Milk

Fiscalini Cheddar

Fiscalini Cheese just won 2 gold medals and 1 silver medal in the cheddar categories in London at the 2007 World Cheese Awards. The 18 month cheddar won the Wyke Farms Trophy for the best extra mature cheddar in the World. This is the first time in the 20 year history of the WCA that this trophy has been awarded to someone outside of Great Britain. It is a semi hard cheese with a natural rind and a mild buttery taste. It is made in the style of a Fontina, but with more salt and a firmer texture. Straw in color, it is a wonderful cheese for snacking. $22.95/lb

Fiscalini Cheddar ‘San Joaquin Gold’

This cheese has a natural, thin rind with a tawny buttery color. Mildly sweet and mellow when young, it develops a darker golden hue and nuttier flavor over time. Its flesh is firm and granular with an aroma of toasted nuts and browned butter. It has pleasant acidity and salt balance with a deep lasting flavor and lovely sweetness. It can be used as a table cheese, melted for use in cooking, or grated as a soup or salad topping. $19.95/lb

Fourme d’Ambert ‘La Tradition’

Fourme d’Ambert is one of the mildest of the blue cheeses; creamy with a delicate fruity flavor and mushroom overtones. Legend says that Fourme d’Ambert was already made at the time of the Druids and the Gauls. It is certainly one of the oldest cheeses in France, made in the Monts de Forez of Auvergne. $14.95/lb

Gouda – Beemster Classic

One of the rarest, most sought after Dutch specially-cured cheeses, made in the southern provinces of the Netherlands for over 800 years. Easy to distinguish, it is the dairy world’s equivalent of a Rembrandt or Van Gogh. This edible opus magnum has been matured for eighteen months, allowing its body to develop a muted caramel color, matched by an intense flavor with a sweet finish. Extra Aged Gouda can be grated or chunked. $16.95/lb

Gruyère Gormino

Gruyère is one of the most famous Swiss cheeses. It is made from cow’s milk and has a nutty, slightly sweet taste with complex musty and mushroomy notes. Our wheels of Gruyère are aged by Rolf Beeler, a master affineur in Zurich, for at least sixteen months, resulting in a slightly granular texture and a firm pâte. A true classic in the Swiss Alpage tradition, Gruyère is also delicious when used in a fondue. Pair this cheese with a Champagne, Syrah, or even Zinfandel. $14.95/lb

Parmagiano Reggiano

This is a cooked and unpressed, semi-fat, hard cheese made from raw cow’s milk. The cheese is encased within a yellowish-golden and slightly oily rind on which the brand name Parmigiano Reggiano is stenciled in small dots. This very flaky and highly soluble cheese is very finely grained and ranges in color from ivory white to straw-yellow. A chief feature of Parmigiano Reggiano is the presence of small white crystals which are indicative of the lengthy ripening period (on average 24 months). The taste is delicate, fragrant and very savory with a lactic and vegetal aroma. $15.99/lb

Piave Vecchio

Here’s a cheese with a heart of gold — hard and rough on the surface and sweetly nutty underneath. With its dry, crunchy texture, flavors of tropical fruit and almonds and its long, sweet finish this popular favorite is likened to the king of Italian cheese, Parmigiano-Reggiano. Piave is wonderful as a table cheese, shaved over a salad of bitter greens, or enjoyed with an aperitif. Like Parmigiano, Piave has an affinity for both red and white wine, but we especially enjoy a fruity Merlot to emphasize the nutty, concentrated kick. $16.95/lb

Sottocenere w/ Truffles

Made with raw cow’s milk and aged about 100 days, Sottocenere is studded with bits of black truffle and rubbed externally with truffle oil. The gray ash coating includes nutmeg, cloves, coriander, cinnamon, licorice and fennel. The dominant aroma is truffle, which seems to come more from the pungent oil than from the specks inside. Under a thin, brittle rind, the paste is a pale butter color with a smooth, moist, semisoft texture. $27.95/lb

Stilton Blue Quenby Hall

Stilton cheese was first made in the early 18th century in the midlands of England, specifically in and around the Melton Mowbray area. Stilton takes its name from the village of Stilton as it was here that the coaches travelling from London to Scotland and other northern cities made their first stop for fresh horses and overnight stays. The village became the centre market place for the cheese with thousands being sold every week. Thus the blue cheese one would buy in Stilton became known as Stilton cheese. $26.95/lb

Goat’s Milk

Beemster Goat Gouda

One of the rarest, most sought after Dutch specially-cured cheeses has been made in the southern provinces of the Netherlands for over 800 years – Extra Aged Farmer Gouda. Easy to distinguish, it is the dairy world’s equivalent of a Rembrandt or Van Gogh. This edible opus magnum has been matured for eighteen months, allowing its body to develop a muted caramel color, matched by an intense flavor with a sweet finish. Extra Aged Gouda can be grated or chunked. $13.99/lb

Garrotxa

Garrotxa is a goat’s milk cheese produced in the Catalonia region in northern Spain. Made in a traditional manner by a small artisanal creamery known for its consistently high quality, and it shows! A semi-soft and compact texture with a light but noticeable coating of velvety, blue-grey mold. The flavor is milky and delicate with a hint of nuttiness and a clean, smooth finish. Garroxta is nice with Champagne, as well as many Spanish varietals including Albarino, Tempranillo, Periquita, Grenache, and Madeira. $24.95/lb

Sheep’s Milk

Cana de Oveja

This is a sheep milk offering from Lorenzo Abellan’s farm — the same man responsible for Cana de Cabra — and Cana de Oveja is quite possibly Spain’s first soft-ripened sheep milk log ever.
Blanketed with a cottony white mold, the cheese immediately under the rind is ecstatically gooey but gives way to a flakier, crumblier center. With notes of tangy butter in the paste, the cheese will intensify the older it gets. This very interesting cheese is unlike most cheeses you will encounter. $15.95/lb

Idiazabal Etxegarai Basque

One of the secrets of Etxegarai cheese lies in the traditional savoir-faire and painstaking control processes, using an excellent raw material – the best pure sheep’s milk – just when it reaches its highest levels of physical-chemical quality. Etxegarai, made with raw sheep’s milk, has been cured for a minimum of three months and the process used to make the smoked variety gives it an attractive golden rind. $18.99/lb

Manchego

Manchego cheese is the most important and well-known sheep’s milk cheese in Spain. The shape of this cheese is very characteristic and defined, due to the traditional use of esparto grass molds which imprint a zigzag pattern along the side of the cheese. The small wooden boards used for pressing the cheese also imprint the typical wheat ear pattern on the top and bottom. Made only from the whole milk of Manchego sheep raised in the “La Mancha” region. $19.95/lb

Pecorino Toscano

This traditional Pecorino Toscano is firm and dense in texture with complex nutty flavor. Traditionally, this cheese is made in Tuscany, which has a long, rich cheese-making history. Our Pecorino Toscano comes in a small, dense round, and looking much like a small Parmesan wheel. The natural rind is dark brown, hard, and dry. The cheese is hard in texture, with a pronounced sheep flavor, and a mild finish. $15.99/lb

Petit Basque

Petit Basque is essentially a mini-wheel (about 1.5 lbs) of traditional “brebis” sheep’s milk cheese made by local Basque standards. Easily recognizable by its classic brownish buffed rind.
The paste is tightly-textured and taffy-like with an oily, olivey, fruity and slightly woodsy flavor. Absolutely one of the best cheeses in the world. Serve with salami, saucisson, prosciutto, olives and peppers. A great picnic cheese. $24.95/lb

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