Seven (!) Caseus awards for cheesemaker Jean Morin

The winningest cheesemaker in Québec: Jean Morin of Fromagerie du Presbytere.

In the 19 years that Sélection Caseus, the Québec cheese competition, has been held, no one single cheesemaker has dominated the judging the way Jean Morin of Fromagerie du Presbytère did this year.

The indefatigable Morin, in collaboration with Marie-Chantal Houde of Fromagerie Nouvelle France, was awarded the prestigious Caseus Or prize for Le Pionnier, a beautiful Alpine-style cheese made with a blend of cow’s and sheep’s milk.

Le Pionnier also was named Best Blended Milk Cheese and Best Raw Milk Cheese.

Jean Morin was honoured four more times:

  • Caseus Bronze — Religieuse, a cow’s milk cheese that is an excellent table cheese and perfect for raclette,
  • Caseus Longaevi — Louis d’Or, 2 years, the multiple-award winner that is Morin’s pride and joy,
  • Best Semi-Soft Cheese — Religieuse,
  • Best Bloomy Rind Cheese — Brie Paysan.
Top prize winner Le Pionnier with collaborators Jean Morin of Fromagerie du Presbytere and Marie-Chantal Houde of Fromagerie Nouvelle France.

In addition to three awards with Pionnier, Marie-Chantal Houde also won with:

  • Best Sheep Milk Cheese — Zacharie Cloutier, 6 months.

Caseus Silver was awarded to Fromagerie La Station de Compton for Chemin Hatley, an organic farmstead cheese with a distinct floral flavor. It also won Best Cow Milk Cheese, Firm or Hard.

Making award-winning cheese at Fromagerie La Station is a family affair for the Bolduc family—and has been for four generations.

Other Caseus award winners:

Business that processes more than a million litres per year

Cow-milk cheese, Washed, mixed or natural rind

Soft

La Sauvagine
La Fromagerie Alexis de Portneuf
Montréal

Semi-soft

OKA Frère Alphonse
Agropur coopérative laitière
Montérégie

Firm or hard

Le Bâtisseur
Fromagerie La Vache à Maillotte
Abitibi-Témiscamingue

Bloomy rind

Le Pleine Lune
Fromagerie DuVillage 1860
Abitibi-Témiscamingue

Business that processes fewer than one million litres per year

Cow-milk cheese, Washed, mixed or natural rind

Soft

14Arpents
Fromagerie Médard
Saguenay – Lac-Saint-Jean

All business sizes

Goat-milk cheese

Washed, mixed or natural rind

Semi-soft

Tomme du Maréchal
Chèvrerie du Buckland
Chaudière-Appalaches

Firm or hard

Le Capra
Fromagerie La Suisse Normande
Lanaudière

Bloomy rind

Grey Owl

Fromagerie Le Détour
Bas-Saint-Laurent

Sheep-milk cheese

Washed, mixed or natural rind

Semi-soft

D’Eschambault
Fromagerie des Grondines
Capitale-Nationale

Bloomy rind

Fleur de Brebis
Fromagerie Le Détour
Bas-Saint-Laurent

All milk types or all business sizes

Unripened

Ricotta Fiorella
Saputo Produits Laitiers Canada s.e.n.c
Montréal

Interior-ripened without ripening holes

Louis Cyr
Fromagerie Bergeron
Chaudière-Appalaches

Interior-ripened with ripening holes

OKA L’Artisan
Agropur coopérative laitière
Montérégie

Best Blue Cheese and Best Organic Cheese: Fleuron made by Fromagerie de la Table Ronde.

Blue-veined

Fleuron
Les Fromagiers de la Table Ronde
Laurentides

Grilling cheese

Le Fleur St-Michel
La Fromagerie du terroir de Bellechasse
Chaudière-Appalaches

Fresh curd cheese

Curds
Fromagerie P’tit Plaisir
Estrie

Cheddar

Agropur Grand Cheddar
Agropur coopérative laitière
Montérégie

Flavoured by smoking, maceration or the addition of favoured ingredients

Cheddar biologique vieilli à la bière noire
Fromagerie Perron
Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean

Flavoured by the addition of spices, vegetables, fruit or nuts

Fleur d’Ail

Fromage au Village
Abitibi-Témiscamingue

Best organic cheese

Fleuron

Les Fromagiers de la Table Ronde
Laurentides

Each year, Québec’s cheesemakers are invited to submit their best creations in the competition. All cheese makers, both large and small, can enter the race and see the fruit of their labour featured among the best cheeses Québec has to offer.

In 2017, after a rigorous evaluation process, a jury of 25 experts judged and assessed more than 217 cheeses, recognized 24 winning cheeses in as many categories, and awarded the prestigious Caseus Or prize to Le Pionnier, created by La Fromagerie du Presbytère and Fromagerie Nouvelle France.

Sélection Caseus is a registered trademark of the Ministère de l’Agriculture, des Pêcheries et de l’Alimentation du Québec (MAPAQ). MAPAQ manages the contest through a steering committee made up of partners from Québec’s cheese industry.

 

 

A delish potato gratin made with five artisan cheeses

Five-cheese Potato Gratin: Scalloped potatoes never tasted so good.
Five-cheese Potato Gratin: Scalloped potatoes never tasted so good.

If you like cheese and if you like potatoes, this Five-Cheese Potato Gratin is the dish for you. This Christmas, we served it with roasted turkey at a Boxing Day family gathering and it was a hit.

Our gratin is based on a recipe developed by Kelly Jaggers who runs the mouth-watering blog Evil Shenanigans, subtitled “Sometimes it’s good to be bad.” Her’s is a four-cheese gratin. We go the extra step with five cheeses, four of them made by Canadian artisans.

Kelly Jagger's dish looks better than ours.
Kelly Jagger’s dish looks better than ours.

The main cheese is Pionnier, a wonderful collaboration by Marie-Chantal Houde of Fromagerie Nouvelle France and Jean Morin of Fromagerie du Presbytère, made in the Jura style with a blend of sheep’s milk and cow’s milk.

The supporting cast includes two cheddars, Avonlea Clothbound and Pine River Aged, and for creaminess, the delicious Laliberté, a triple-cream cheese made by Jean Morin.

The final touch, as the topping, is 30-month Parmigiano-Reggiano, imported simply because no one in Canada comes close to matching the Italian classic.

Bon appétit!

Bleu d’Élizabeth best of the best in Québec cheese

Caseus winners Dominic and Jean Morin of Fromagerie du Presbytere.
Caseus winners Dominic (left) and Jean Morin of Fromagerie du Presbytère.

For the second year in a row, Bleu d’Élizabeth made by Fromagerie du Presbytère has won the coveted gold medal in the Caseus Québec Fine Cheese Competition, the annual judging of cow-, goat- and sheep-milk cheeses produced by Québec cheesemakers.

For its repeat performance, Bleu d’Élizabeth was also honored with the Caseus Emeritus award.

For the Morin brothers—Jean is the cheesemaker, Dominic manages the fourth-generation dairy farm—the awards just keep on coming. Earlier this year, Bleu d’Élizabeth won two medals in the Canadian Cheese Grand Prix, for best blue and best organic cheese. Two years, ago Élizabeth was named runner-up in the prestigious American Cheese Society competition.

What’s the secret to their success? Happy cows is Jean Morin’s stock answer, but he adds: “Every morning I start the day by asking myself what I can do better today than yesterday.”

Bleu d'Élizabeth
Bleu d’Élizabeth

That drive for perfection shows in Bleu d’Élizabeth, so soft, rich and creamy, with lovely grey-greenish veins, with understated saltiness, and a distinct earthy aroma.

The Caseus awards were presented yesterday in the National Assembly in Québec City by Agriculture Minister Francois Gendron. More than 40 producers entered 165 cheeses in 24 categories of competition.

Mont Jacob
Mont Jacob

The Caseus silver medal went to Mont Jacob, a washed-rind cheese made by Fromagerie Blackburn, while the bronze was awarded to Pionnier, a firm cheese made with a blend of cow and sheep milk in a collaboration between Jean Morin of Fromagerie du Presbytère and Marie-Chantal Houde of Fromagerie Nouvelle France.

Pionnier with its two collaborators
Pionnier with its two collaborators

A new Caseus medal honoring excellence in aged cheese went to the 24-month Alfred Le Fermier made by Fromagerie La Station.

Alfred Le Fermier
Alfred Le Fermier

For the winners in all Caseus categories, please click here.

The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food is the lead sponsor for the Caseus competition. The Institute of Food Technology, Campus Saint-Hyacinthe, manages the judging.

This year for the first time the jury included a judge from Ontario, Vanessa Simmons of Ottawa, cheese sommelier at Savvy Company and presenter of guided tastings at The Great Canadian Cheese Festival.

For information about the availability of all winners except Mont Jacob, contact Plaisirs Gourmets. For information on Mont Jacob, contact Fromages CDA.