Altered Tastes: Epoisses

-
I am sorry for folks who are new to the blog, expecting me to be all sous-vide this and sous-vide that.  I promise I will get back to you with your regularly scheduled broadcasting.  But in the interim, I need to continue to write about the trip to France.  Paris was amazing, and there were many delicious meals.  Summing them up quickly: Bistro Paul Bert, Comptoir Du Relais, Chateaubriand, L'Atalier du Joel Robuchon, and the wedding I was fortunate enough to be able to attend.  I am pretty sure those five meals accounted for about 30 individual plates of food, if not more.  All of them awesome, special and deserving more detail than you are going to get.

Day 1 Route

After the aforementioned wedding, we rented a car with the plan of driving around France looking for adventure and cheese and wine.  We left Paris and headed for the number one place I wanted to go to.  Epoisses.  The actual town where the cheese is made.

The first time I had this amazing cheese was at Artisanal, a cheese-centric bistro helmed by Terrance Brennan.  The stank of a thousand cheeses kick your teeth in the second you arrive. The first time I ate there, someone at the table ordered this cheese. As it made its way around the table, a pattern started to emerge.  Take a bite, eyes roll back in head, moaning.  By the time it made its way to me, it was being called 'The Orgasm Cheese'.  One bite later, and I pretty much had made a new friend-with-benefits for life.

And now I get to meet her parents...

If you want to know how serious this country is about cheese, I shall simultaneously present to you Exhibit A, and my closing arguments, in the form of a single picture:


The above picture was taken at a GAS STATION off of a highway. A GAS STATION.  Have I mentioned that you can PURCHASE GAS AND EPOISSES at the SAME FUCKING PLACE.  I wish I had taken a second picture so you could see that this place looked exactly like a GAS STATION.  There were refrigerated units with the usual array of softdrinks, pre-packaged sandwiches, maps, potato chips and, oh yeah, intricate, complex and downright funky cheeses that if you opened up in the confines of a car would surely kill you.

I digested that experience for about 45 minutes, before we finally arrived in Epoisses.
Epoisses.  Population: Om Nom Nom

Turns out, Epoisses isa sleepy little hallow.  And not so much sleepy as it was completely.  closed.  I mean it.  Only signs of life were these fine ladies:

Cows in Epoisses.  Let's Pretend Their Milk Makes Epoisses.
So, onward we marched... arriving in Dijon.  Dijon is larger than Epoisses, but still pretty dead.  Still having some fight left in us, we took the Burgundy Wine Road down to Beaune. On the way to the wine road, we drove by the Gaugry Fromagerie, one of larger Epoisses manufacturers.  Also closed.

Paradise Closed.
We finally stopped in Beaune.  After getting settled in the Hotel, we went into town to grab dinner, and, during the Dessert course, I finally found my precious Epoisses.  It was, of course, amazing.  It was hands down the best piece of Epoisses I have ever had.  The texture simultaneously gooey and firm, best described as uni-like in texture, combined with the incredible complexities of this pomice-brandy washed-rind cheese.  My memories of eating this cheese mostly converge on a moment where I believe I was wielding my knife like a broken beer bottle, menacing waitstaff and my girlfriend alike if they made any sudden movements towards the cheese.

The best piece of Epoisses I have ever eaten.

Even though Fromagerie Gaugry was closed, the next day we backtracked up here (~40 minutes) in an attempt to get to the source.  Of course, it was. still. closed.  But this time just for the standard French lunch hours. yeah, hours.  Fuck those guys.  Finally, it opened and we did a little tour of the factory.  Moneyshot:

Paradise Found.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Escolar: The World's Most Dangerous Fish

-
Image
Escolar is the most controversial fish that you are likely to find in your fish market. This firm, white fleshed fish has an incredibly rich flavor, often described as 'succulent', or a fattier version of swordfish. Why so rich? It turns out that Escolar's diet contains food high in wax esters. Wax esters that are really difficult for Escolar to digest. As a result, these esters build up in the fish. Where is the controversy in a buttery, delicious fish? I would say it is in the laxative like effect it has on a certain percentage of the population. Well, a 'laxative like effect' is how my fish monger described it. Others would describe it as closer to diahhrea. An expert would call it 'keriorrhoea'. Literally translated, it means 'flow of wax'. Oily orange droplets pouring out your pooper.  Keriorrhoea occurs because the wax esters in the flesh of the fish pool up in your intestine. Some reports of Escolar related illness include cramp...
Read more

White Tuna Explained (Escolar vs. Albacore)

-
Image
I am not the first person on the Internet to tell you that White Tuna is a confusing order at the sushi bar.  While there are a host of fish that can be mislabeled as White Tuna, the two most common ones are the Albacore Tuna and our dreaded and delicious friend, the Escolar . What Is White Tuna? I worked really hard to source both fish in a raw form so that I could bring you pictures.  And by 'worked really hard', I really mean: I would keep going to the same fishmonger and ask them if they had Escolar and Albacore.  Escolar isn't very difficult to find but Albacore can be problematic.  Finally, I found some at the Lobster Place  in Chelsea Market. So, let's take a quick look:
Read more

Roasted Garlic Powder: Perfect For Sous Vide Cooking

-
Image
I have always used garlic powder.  I am pretty heavy handed with it.  It used to be my salt.  After starting to cook sous vide, that love has been rekindled.  This is because most advice around sous vide discourages the use of fresh garlic.  According to baldwind : "Finally, raw garlic produces very pronounced and unpleasant results and powdered garlic (in very small quantities) should be substituted." After reading that, I set out to make garlic powder.  It is ridiculously simple, and like all things culinary, when you can control it, you can make it better.  In this case, you have three major wins: Before you begin making garlic powder, you can control the quality of the garlic.  Like most spices you buy, it is hard to determine original quality and how long it has been deteriorating on a grocery shelf or storeroom. Roasting.  You can bring the noise by roasting the garlic.  When you compare the aroma and flavor of your homemade...
Read more