Our favourite Christmas greeting this year comes from Fromagerie du Pied-de-Vent on Îles de la Madeleine via Plaisirs Gourmets.

As you can see, the image shows a herd of cows of the famed Canadienne heritage breed at pasture on the rolling hills of the Magdalen Islands—with the sun’s rays piercing through clouds. Those rays, in the local dialect, are called pied-de-vent.

Click here to read more about Pied-de-Vent, the Canadienne breed and my pilgrimages to the islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in a piece I wrote last year for a special edition of Culture: the word on cheese.

—Georgs Kolesnikovs

Georgs Kolesnikovs, Cheese-Head-in-Chief of CheeseLover, is founder of The Great Canadian Cheese Festival.