About THE CHEESE

First off, major kudos to Hallie for a delicious paella and many thanks to Kate and Jenny for offering up their place.  Food group was great fun!  Do you think we should have a better name than "Food Group"?  Maybe.  Whatevs.  Perhaps the simplicity of the group's name belies its epic scale and makes for classy understatement.

Anyway, I volunteered for cheese duty, as I work right near America's greatest cheese shop, Murray's Cheese.  Murray's cheesemongers will enquire about your tastes and what else you're serving to steer you towards the best in aged dairy products, with unlimited sampling until you hit on a winner.  My cheesemonger helped me choose a Manchego, a Spanish classic (that was on sale, thankfully... Murray's isn't exactly cheap), and a goat cheese with a crazy rind.  It's called "Queso del Tietar," which I think means "Cheese of Tietar" (I have crazy linguistic skills).  Here's what Murray's says about it:

Made by a single producer, Rafael Baez, of Avila in Castilla y Leon, this bizarre and exuberant goat cheese is shaped like a log, but is said to resemble the leg of a mule. A rind composed of ash and mold means insistent flavor, more like a blue cheese than anything else. The damp, cakey acidic paste near the rind is fierce, with unmistakable overtones of black walnut. Inside, the core remains salty, lactic, and soothing. A relatively new cheese on the scene, Monte Enebro won top goat cheese in Spain in 2003. That insistent flavor is pacified by sweeter wines made from the charming Muscat grape.

And it's all true!  It totally looked like the leg of a mule!  A delightfully cheesy, lactic mule!