Featured Cheese - October 2020

Based in Thorp, Wisconsin, Marieke® Gouda was founded in 2006 by husband and wife team Marieke and Rolf Penterman. Originally from the Netherlands, Marieke missed the Gouda style cheeses she grew up with, so after two years of study, she created her first wheel. Just four months later, her first round of the Foenegreek Gouda was submitted to the US Cheese Championships and won a gold medal. Since then the Foenegreek Gouda has won numerous medals from various US and international competitions. The Foenegreek Gouda is made as a traditional gouda with the addition of fenugreek, an herb which gives the cheese a sweet and nutty flavor similar to maple syrup.

Purple Haze is a fresh goat’s milk cheese flavored with lavender buds and wild harvested fennel pollen. The name, inspired by Jimi Hendrix’s classic song, reflects more of the appearance rather than the taste of the cheese. This chevre has a sweet, flowery (but not overwhelming) flavor of soft, creamy texture. Pair it with crackers, ripe figs or Zinfandel.

The Erb family's New Hampshire farm has been nestled in the foothills of the White Mountains since the 1950’s, but married couple Doug and Debbie Erb left the milk commodity business in 2008 to begin making cheese. Though the cheese bears the name of their farm, Landaff, it is actually crafted in the style of the Welsh cheese Caerphilly. The couple learned to make this traditional cheese from the Duckett family in Somerset, England.

L’Etivaz, named after a small Swiss mountain village, is said to be made as Gruyere cheese was once made over a century ago. An AOP designated cheese, L'Etivaz is made from milk from a small cooperative of 76 cheesemakers that felt that government regulations were enabling cheesemakers to produce Gruere in a way that compromised its original flavor profile and integrity. In the 1930s they created L’Etivaz and eventually sought and obtained AOP designation.

Procured and aged at the renowned Fromagerie L'Amuse in Santpoort-Noord, Holland, just outside of Amsterdam, each batch of L’Amuse Gouda is selected for us by L’ Amuse owner Betty Koster. It’s aged for over a year, allowing big crunchy flavor crystals to develop. Over the years, owners Betty and Martin Koster have built up the L’Amuse brand to be one of the more respected gouda producers in the country through their affinage, or cheese maturation process.