{"id":3527,"date":"2012-05-28T06:39:31","date_gmt":"2012-05-28T10:39:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cheeseloverca.wordpress.com\/?p=3527"},"modified":"2012-05-28T06:39:31","modified_gmt":"2012-05-28T10:39:31","slug":"vancouver-island-produces-a-world-champion-brie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/2012\/05\/28\/vancouver-island-produces-a-world-champion-brie\/","title":{"rendered":"Vancouver Island produces a world-champion brie"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Comox Brie from Natural Pastures Cheese of Vancouver Island.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It takes a big person to admit a big mistake.\u00a0 And I\u2019m, um, a big person.\u00a0 I can\u2019t believe it! I have made a grievous cheese-based error.\u00a0 I have somehow overlooked the World Championship Cheese<\/em> Contest<\/em> gold medalist\u2014even though it\u2019s made in my own backyard.\u00a0 Forgive me, cheese gods!<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was in my local market in Vancouver the other day, checking out the cheese\u2014as I always do\u2014when something caught my eye on the package of Comox Brie.\u00a0 That something was a Gold medal.<\/em> Yikes! A cheese Gold medal.\u00a0 You see, I purposefully overlooked this cheese BECAUSE it\u2019s always at my local market. I made the mistake of assuming that anything that could be widely purchased was crap, and that\u2019s just foolish snobbery on my part. Do not be trapped into this assumption. I can\u2019t tell you how many \u201cartisan\u201d type handmade cheeses I have tried that were just kind of meh<\/em>, and how many widely available cheeses I have tried that really rocked.\u00a0 I know, it seems wrong<\/em>, but I must speak the cheese truth.<\/p>\n

Comox Brie comes from the town of Courtenay, a small town on Vancouver Island with a close connection to my own hometown, Powell River.\u00a0 I spent many days in my youth wandering the little streets of this town. Comox is an even tinier little town near Courtnenay. Comox Brie takes its name from this town.\u00a0 Sweet. I feel almost like cousins.<\/p>\n

Natural Pastures Cheese Company<\/a> is a family owned affair.\u00a0 The Smith family makes only \u201cartisan cheeses,\u201d all hand-made under the guidance of their very own Swiss\u00a0 Master Cheesemaker Paul Sutter, originally from Switzerland where he received traditional Swiss training and professional accreditation. For the record, I also would like my very own Master Swiss cheesemaker!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Guest blogger and author Willow Yamauchi.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Natural Pastures sources all the milk from its own farm, Beaver Meadow, as well as a handful of other local farms, all on Vancouver Island. Thus the \u201cterroir\u201d of the\u00a0 coastal valley environment is evident in this cheese\u2014all the milk coming from a single area.\u00a0 Interestingly, when I was a child we sometimes ate bear.\u00a0 If the bear had been feastin<\/p>\n

g on berries, the meat was sweet and succulent.\u00a0 If, however, the bear had been feasting on salmon, the meat was, well, fishy.\u00a0 This is an example of terroir that I just wanted to share with you, because it\u2019s my blog, and I can say whatever I want!\u00a0 Ha!<\/p>\n

I digress.\u00a0 The Smith family turned to cheesemaking in 2001 and have made a big splash on the cheese world winning 40-plus prestigious national and international awards. How did I miss this?\u00a0 Scratches head.\u00a0 Interestingly, the farms they work with, \u201cHeritage Dairy Farms,\u201d are committed to environmental sustainability including natural wildlife habitat. Their\u00a0 enhanced stream habitats raise thousands of wild Coho Salmon each year which could be eaten by bears causing a unique salmon terroir.\u00a0 See, full circle logic.<\/p>\n

I digress again.\u00a0 Natural Pastures Cheese Comox Brie earned the pinnacle World Championship Gold Medal in the 27th biennial World Championship Cheese Contest<\/a>, a technical evaluation of cheese by an international panel of 22 judges, experts in cheese evaluation. Again, I shall volunteer to be a judge at this event.\u00a0 It saddens me that I have not been called upon to judge cheese, as I am so clearly qualified!<\/p>\n

I digress yet again.\u00a0 As the first World Championship cheese ever produced from Vancouver Island and the first WCC gold medal Brie ever from western Canada, scoring 98.95, Comox Brie edged out Damafro’s double cr\u00e8me from Quebec (which I previously reviewed and ADORED, OMG, so good). \u00a0 Comox Brie begins with milk from a herd of Ayrshire cattle raised by Guy Sim, a Canada Master Breeder. Wow, this cheese and the cows all have their own pedigree! I\u2019m assuming this is a pasteurized cheese, but I can\u2019t be sure. I\u2019m about 99.99% certain of this, but as the wrapper has disappeared and it doesn\u2019t say on the website, it\u2019s an educated guess at this point.<\/p>\n

I have actually had a hard time reviewing Comox Brie, chiefly because everyone in my family kept eating it before I was ready to sample it.\u00a0 My small wedge\u2014which was much larger before the swarm of locusts known as my family descended upon it\u2014is a typical white-looking brie: penicillium mold on the outside (yup, the white stuff is mold, deal with it) and creamy buttery interior.\u00a0 I have wisely chosen to taste this one right before the best before date, when the brie is perfect.\u00a0 Like women, brie really must be aged in order to achieve true greatness.\u00a0 You can tell a brie is ready if it\u2019s gooey inside. If it\u2019s kind of dry and chalky, you have a young brie. Put it back! This Comox Brie is gorgeous looking, so creamy and succulent, it smells\u00a0 faintly of ammonia, mushroom and um, adult pleasures . . . shall I leave it at that?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Here goes\u2026.<\/p>\n

Mmmmm . . . Oh my lord, now this is a great brie. Like, really, really great. It\u2019s perfectly ripened, look at the picture above, see how it\u2019s gooey all the way through, that\u2019s what you want! \u00a0It\u2019s making love to my teeth and tongue.\u00a0 It\u2019s salty and creamy and slightly uric and carnal . . . Oh yes, this is a carnal little cheese. This is actually quite a naughty little cheese. This is the way I always want brie to be but it rarely is.\u00a0 It\u2019s absolutely divine.\u00a0 Yes, this is a Gold Medal winner\u2014all the way.\u00a0 Scrumptious!\u00a0 Go and get yourself some of this, stat.\u00a0 Let it ripen up until the best before date and go for it. You\u2019ll thank me later.<\/p>\n

\u2014Willow Yamauchi<\/p>\n

Guest blog courtesy of Willow Yamauchi, creater of My Blog of Cheese<\/a>: My 100-day gastronomic journey into fromage\u2014one day at a time\u2014one cheese at a time. Comox Brief was her 113rd cheese in an ongoing quest for pleasure.<\/em><\/p>\n

Natural Pastures Cheese is a Featured Cheesemaker at the second annual Great Canadian Cheese Festival<\/a> taking place this weekend in Picton, in Ontario’s Prince Edward County.<\/em> Doug Smith, one of three brothers operating Natural Pastures, will be featured in the Breakfast of Champions<\/a> presentation.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

Festival tickets are available online<\/a>. Buy in advance and save money for cheese purchases.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It takes a big person to admit a big mistake.\u00a0 And I\u2019m, um, a big person.\u00a0 I can\u2019t believe it! I have made a grievous cheese-based error.\u00a0 I have somehow overlooked the World Championship Cheese […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57,199,304],"tags":[],"brand":[],"class_list":["post-3527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-brie","category-great-canadian-cheese-festival","category-natural-pastures-cheese"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3527\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3527"},{"taxonomy":"brand","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheeselover.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/brand?post=3527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}