Now don't get me wrong; whenever I see a foreign person in this city I'm always in seventh heaven. It's probably because I'm still mostly in doubt about this country's worth in the eyes of foreigners.
Still, it was all nice and dandy until another student from our group talked to him - which is not long enough. The reason behind this is that we were too many today to fit into a single laboratory and we were split into two. And since today Ágota and I seemed to be the only ones to talk English, we had to work together.
I probably seemed like a total douchebag to the guy, because I rarely talked at first. You know how it is with me - it takes some time to get used to the thought that I won't be ridiculed.
Also, the fact that we were in a class that had a lot of technical words, I have to tell you, it wasn't pretty. Thankfully the guy knew enough Romanian to understand most of it, because I sure as hell would not have been able to explain it to him (mostly, because I didn't even understand some terms on my own either).
But yeah, it was awesome. Awkward and weird, but totally cool. We had to analyze some soil, and thus we "played around" in much for quite a while. A fine way to spend the first class with a foreigner!
Anyways, guys, on a presentation today (some guy from Belgium) I kind of spaced out -sorry about that!- and my thoughts went to cheese. Don't ask me why, it just did. And I was just wondering about how many different types of cheese exists in the world, so I promised to myself that I will write a post on this topic.
The trouble is, that now that I looked into it - there are just so many I can barely count them. Some people say that there are about 900 different kinds - 400 of which seem to come only from France. And this doesn't even take into account the numbers of "home-made" cheeses, or the ones people are making just to experiment.
Even if I were to chose a single type of cheese from each country, I would have to make a post with about 70 different types.
So I propose the following: if you want a more-or-less complete list of cheeses, you can go visit THIS site. Yeah, it's Wikipedia, so sue me. Also, if you go on that site don't forget to check out the side-lists that will take you to different part of the internet (like the list of French cheeses).
Now, for those who don't give a crap about this, I'm going to just select a few interesting ones, and make a list of it for you guys. This will mean that there will not be any "popular" ones, like Mozzarella or Brie or anything like that. I'm going to try to awe you.
1. Cahill's Farm Cheddar
This cheese comes from Ireland. Limerick, to be more exact. Now, if that doesn't sound good to you, how about this: this particular cheese was made on the Cahill farm since the 1950's, and it's suitable for every vegetarian, because they don't use any animal rennet in it (rennet is a group of enzymes found in a mammal's stomach that's used by many different cheese manufacturers). Now, to be more cool, the Cahill Farm cheeses come in different form. There's a black waxed cheese with fresh chives, a green waxed cheese with mixed herbs, a red waxed one with red wine, a brown waxed one with Guinness and a yellow one with Kilbeggan Irish Whiskey.
2. Halloumi
This one come from Cyprus, and it was originally made during the Medieval Byzantine period. The texture is similar to Mozzarella, it has a very high melting point (so it can be fried or grilled), and it comes with mint.
The mint is used to add to the taste, and because Halloumi keeps better and stays fresh for a longer time if it is wrapped in mint leaves.
It is apparently eaten quite a lot of times alongside watermelons.
3. Saxon Shires
This one is made by taking Great Britain's five best cheeses (that's Double Gloucester, Leicester, Lancashire, Derby and Cheddar), and combining them all in different layers.
It's unique, because you can taste the different kinds of cheeses in it if you eat them layer by layer, but when you eat it as a whole, it will have a totally different taste.
It also looks pretty good.
4. Schabzieger
This cheese is greenish, and it has a very spicy taste, because they add fenugreek to it. It comes from Switzerland, and it is 100% fat free.
It was first manufactured by monks in the 8th century.
5. Red Windsor
This one resembles the first one a bit. It's an English cheddar cheese, made with pasteurized cow milk that's mixed together either with Bordeaux wine, or a blend of port wine and brandy.
And now on to the more... unappetizing ones.
6. Stinking Bishop Cheese
This particular cheese comes from a farm in Gloucestershire, and it's produced since 1972. It is made with the milk of Cloucester cattle, and it was named for the distinctive odour that usually comes from it. You see, this particular cheese is washed down when it's ripening, with nothing else but a perry made from the Stinking Bishop pear (this pear got this name, because Mr. Bishop, the breeder was apparently in a need of a good anger management therapy). This happens every fourth week, repeated until the cheese matures.
7. Morbier
This cheese comes from France, and the reason it landed on the list is because the dark line you can see on the pic. If you thought that that was mold, you are mistaken.
The black layer in it is nothing else but ash.
You see, this cheese originally came to be when cheesemakers ended a day with leftover curd. They used ash on top of them to protect it. The next day, they would top it all off with new milk that came from the morning milking.
This cheese apparently has a very strong flavor, and it also has a slightly bitter aftertaste. (Also, the traditional ash was replaced by vegetable dye in this modern society. Tho I do believe that I would actually like to eat the ash than the dye)
+1. Casu Marzu
If you are squeamish, you should close the window right now. I left the worst for the last.
Casu Marzu is a Sardinian cheese made from Sheep milk. It is most notable, because it contains live insect larvae.
This particular cheese goes beyond fermentation to a stage of decomposition, which means that the cheese fly is doing its job. The fun part of it, I believe is where the larvae are deliberately introduce to the cheese.
To make this worse, these larvae, when disturbed, can launch themselves for distances of 15 centimeters.
Oh, and there's one more thing. When the maggots in the cheese are dead, be sure to stay away from it (if you managed to stay near it until now).
So how do people eat this cheese? It depends.
If someone likes to eat the maggots, they will just simply place their hands above their sandwich so they won't jump around the dinner table. If they are unwilling to go this far, though, they place the sandwiches in bags and seal them up. The maggots won't get enough oxygen like this, and they will start jumping out of it, producing a popping noise as they hit the bag. When the noises subside, it means the maggots are dead and you can finish your dinner.
Heh. Kind of reminds me of popcorn. Bon Appetite!
