My Meals are on Wheels

Cheese of the Week – Blue Cheese

One of my favorite Cheese!

Blue Cheese

It is a white cheese with blue veins and sometimes crumbly interior. This cheese usually has tangy, piquant, spicy and peppery flavor.

Gorgonzola, a veined blue cheese from Italy.

Use in salad dressings with cream cheese for spreads.

Country:
Texture: hard

Blue cheese is a general classification of cow’s milk, sheep’s milk, or goat’s milk cheeses that have had cultures of the mold Penicillium added so that the final product is spotted or veined throughout with blue, blue-gray or blue-green mold, and carries a distinct smell, either from that or various specially cultivated bacteria. Some blue cheeses are injected with spores before the curds form and others have spores mixed in with the curds after they form. Blue cheeses are typically aged in a temperature-controlled environment such as a cave. Blue cheese can be eaten by itself or can be crumbled or melted over foods.

In the European Union many blue cheeses such as Roquefort, Gorgonzola and Blue Stilton carry a protected designation of origin, meaning they can bear the name only if they have been made in a particular region in a certain country. Similarly, individual countries have protections of their own such as France’s Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée and Italy’s Denominazione di Origine Protetta. Blue cheeses with no protected origin name are designated simply “blue cheese”.

Blue cheese is believed to have been discovered by accident. The caves in which early cheeses were aged shared the properties of being temperature and moisture controlled environments, as well as being favorable to many varieties of harmless mold. Roquefort is said to have been invented in 1070 AD. Gorgonzola is one of the oldest known blue cheeses, having been created around 879 AD, though it is said that it did not actually contain blue veins until around the 11th century. Stilton is a relatively new addition occurring sometime in the 18th century. Many varieties of blue cheese that originated subsequently were an attempt to fill the demand for Roquefort-style cheeses that were prohibitive due to either cost or politics.

Blue cheese is a common categorization of cow’s milk and/or goat’s milk cheeses with a blue or blue-green mold. The blue mold in these cheeses is due to mold spores from Penicillium roqueforti or Penicillium glaucum to name a few.

Most blue cheeses (bleu cheese) today are either injected with the mold or the mold is mixed right in with the curds, to ensure an even distribution of the mold. Blue cheese was initially produced in caves, where there was a natural presence of mold. Most of these cheeses must still be matured or aged in the caves where they were originally developed. So the longer it ages, the more intense the flavour and smoother the texture. A combination of mold and other ingredients make up the color, flavor and texture of the cheese.

Many blue cheeses are made from whole cow’s milk, but there are also made with goat’s milk. These complex blue cheeses are usually categorized as some of the best cheeses in the world. There flavor is usually strong, and have a tangy taste that differentiate these type of cheeses from others.

Types of Blue Cheese
• Gorgonzola – This blue cheese is from Italy and is made from cow’s milk.
• Stilton – This cheese is considered to be the king English cheeses, it is manufactured from sheep or cow’s milk.
• Roquefort – This is made from cow’s milk and is one of France’s national treasures. It is somewhat porous and has a green color rather than blue streaks. It has a soft, creamy texture and has a spicy taste.
• Cabrales – is one of the four most famous blue cheeses. It is a combination of cow, sheep and goat’s milk.
• Danablu – One of the most well-known blue cheeses originally from Denmark.
• Benedictine Bleu – This cheese is from Canada and has been famous since 1943.