Jasper Hill Farm Bayley Hazen Blue Cheese

Bayley Hazen Blue: Buttery and rich, yet wonderfully piquant; utterly delicious. Made from the morning milking of the farm's Ayrshire cows. Enjoy on its own, as an hors d'oeuvre, or after dinner with a glass of tawney port.

 

Side note: Bayley and Hazen were revolutionary war generals who were stationed along the Canadian Front in anticipation of a battle with the English that never manifested.

Size: 1lb wedge

 

The Story:

One day a regular customer introduced me to her son and daughter-in-law who were about to embark on an ambitious project: to start a cheese making operation up north, and make a number of different types of cheese. Blue, cheddar and a brie-style cheese were all in their plans, they said, and I smiled and nodded politely, thinking these kids were out of their minds. I figured I'd believe it when I saw it—cheese-making is hard work, and they were talking about 3 totally different types of cheese, with 3 different needs in terms of molds, environment, and so on. I'd tried a lot of lousy locally made cheeses by well-intentioned customers, and I was sure this was another case of starry-eyed back-to-the-landers who knew not a thing about cows or cheese.

5 years later, Mateo and Andy Kehler are the movie stars of the cheese world. They not only make fabulous cheeses themselves (cheese guru Max McCalman lists 2 of them in his book Cheese: A Conoisseur's Guide to the World's Best); they now advise others on cheesemaking, and are building a cave in which to age other people's cheeses. Including Cabot's. Plus, they're really young and really good-looking, and have cute kids. And have been written up in every trade publication, and the New York Times, and Saveur magazine, and so on and so on. So I guess you could say I was wrong.

--Amelia