The Gruyère Experience in Switzerland, Part 2
Our story left off when you had just heard that Maria was going to milk a cow that afternoon, won't you join us as The Gruyère Experience in Switzerland continues!
Swiss Cheese (6)
Trying Raclette at Chirripoberg, San Rafael Norte, Costa Rica
Ever tried Raclette before? We knew it was a cheese dish that originated in Switzerland but had never come across it on a menu until arriving in Costa Rica this year. It always surprises us the things that we find there!
A Behind the Scenes look at a Twitter Chat-WineAndCheeseFriday is featured on #WiningHourChat
During a WiningHourChat in the beginning of the year, a suggestion was made to have a Wine and Cheese Theme on a future Tuesday night. So immediately after the chat ended, I contacted the hostesses to figure out what time of the year would be good for all of us. We decided to hold it on National Cheese Day in June. This got the ideas flowing in my mind. What would we talk about? What wines and cheeses should we taste? What would my role as guest be? The hostesses will tell you that this spurred a bunch of ideas and messages from me in the coming days.
Tocornal Carmenere and Swiss cheese
When I saw this wine in the store I was a little confused. It said the name of the wine but then "by Cono Sur” at the bottom of the label. I decided not to get it the first time around because we had a few wines already queued up for future WineAndCheeseFriday pairings. I contacted Cono Sur on Twitter to ask about this mysterious line of wines since I couldn’t find it on their website. As always they were very helpful and said was it called “Tocornal?” Yes, that’s one of ours, but its only distributed in Canada, Latin America and Russia. Well this created a buzz on Twitter and for me so I figured I should go back and find it. A week later in another grocery store, there it was and, lucky us, they had a Carmenere! What a fun chance to compare the Bicicleta Carmenere from a few years ago, https://wineandcheesefriday.com/carmenere-and-camembert/, to the Tocornal Carmenere now. The cheese is from our giant farmer’s market, La Feria. We found this cheese in Colibri's Corner, the booth on the end. This booth always has all sorts of tasty treats like spices, baked goods and chocolate. Neil picked up this wedge of cheese and said it smelled kind of smoky and that we should get it. Always on a quest for new cheese, I happily agreed.
Bodkin Blanc de Sauvignon Blanc and Emmentaler Cheese
We had some friends in town from Switzerland so when I saw the Swiss flag on this cheese, it seemed like a good choice. We didn’t expect to learn so much by eating a “swiss cheese” with Swiss people. The wine is a sparking wine that we picked up on our recent trip to Lake County (http://mferraro73.tumblr.com/post/119076681308/lake-county-wine-tasting-in-order-to-celebrate) and the tasting notes for the cheese appeared to be a good pairing for the wine flavors.
Merlot and Swiss
This week we are trying out our new wine and cheese list from BevMo (www.bevmo.com). It should be interesting since Merlot and Swiss cheese are both very common to most people.