Serious Cheese: Murray's Cuts the Cheese
"Serving cheese plates to your guests that have five or six equally portioned, triangular cheeses is a beautiful thing."
The knowledgeable folks at New York's Murray's Cheese have launched a series of interesting and helpful cheese videos on their website. The first series covers Portion Control, or how to properly cut different types of cheeses based on their shape and texture.
Taylor Cocalis, Murray's director of education, hosts the videos, which cover exactly how to cut and portion all of the major types of cheeses: lightly aged goat, bloomy rind, washed rind, pressed, cooked, and blue. Usually learning such things requires purchasing an expensive ticket to one of Murray's otherwise excellent classes, but these videos are free.
Now, not long ago, I made the case here that in general we shouldn't be so fussy about serving cheese; it should be more about fun than perfection. On the other hand, as always with food, presentation goes a long way, and serving cheese plates to your guests that have five or six equally portioned, triangular cheeses is a beautiful thing. It can also be quite difficult, as cheeses come in various shapes and sizes; it's not always easy to figure out how to cut perfect triangular one-ounce pieces. After watching these videos, it'll be as easy as cake.
Cheese can be an intimidating thing to choose and serve, and videos like these go a long way to showing you what you need to know. I hope Murray's continues to publish these. Even though their quality leaves something to be desired, the content is great.
About the author: Jamie Forrest publishes Curdnerds.com from his apartment in Brooklyn, New York, where he lives with his wife, his daughter, and his cheese.
View other entries from Serious Cheese.
Add a comment:
Previewing your comment:
HTML Hints
Some HTML is OK: <a href="URL">link</a>, <strong>strong</strong>, <em>em</em>
Comment Guidelines
Post whatever you want, just keep it seriously about eats, seriously. We reserve the right to delete off-topic or inflammatory comments. Learn more at our Comment Policy page.
If you see something not so nice, please, report an inappropriate comment.
2 Comments:
I hope they splurge on a microphone for future episodes. Also, if they clip a piece of that cheese paper to a bright desk lamp, they'd get a really nice diffuse light source. And some close ups of the product would do wonders.
kevster at 11:51AM on 03/03/09
I always applaud any attempt at cheese education, but I'm still an imperfect cheese server myself. Thanks for link to the videos!
mncheese at 12:03PM on 03/03/09