Cheese Blog

Jeanne Carpenter of Cheese Underground and photographer Becca Dilley have crafted a calendar that celebrates twelve of the best cheeesmakers in Wisconsin. Each artisan gets a month to themselves, accompanied by a picture of them with their cheese at their farm, or with their animals.

You hear that summer is the slow time of the year, when everyone is lounging on porches and taking their time sipping mint juleps or sweet tea, but so not so with cheese events. Summer is when the big whammies are taking place, being announced, or crafted for fall or winter.

Sure, cheese will go to movies alone, taking pleasure in having the entire box of Reeses Pieces to itself. It is happy to sit solo at a lunch counter with a slice of bread and revel in the quiet simplicity. But at the end of the day, it likes conversation, an exchange of ideas and flavors, and maybe a drink or two. It craves company.

Only recently have people started to ask me about my favorite cheese books. This could be bemuse there have been a smattering of volumes released within a year or two that have caught the public eye, or it could be because the cheese bounty in the United States is growing and people can't help but rejoice and notice. Either way, this is good.

Cows dot hills in California, not sheep. So when a new wheel rolls around with a pretty ewe on the label, people notice. When the cheese it produces rivals Vermont Shepherd in complexity, people start running after the wheels to chase down a taste.