This evening I volunteered at a Slow Food NYC event about American Artisan Cheeses.  The panel discussion was a lively affair with Jeffrey Roberts, Liz McAllister of Cato Corner Farm, Karen Weinberg of Three Corner Field Farm, Peter Dixon of Consider Bardwell Farm and Anne Saxelby of Saxelby Cheesemongers.  Oh and those samplings....

I remember travelling through France (many moons ago) and being assaulted not only by a huge variety of cheeses, but stores that focused solely on cheese and neighborhood Marches that proudly displayed Made in France artisan cheese.  What a shock to the system at a time when in America our choices extended to a few different colored cheese slices separated by antiseptic plastic wraps sold in dirty, dark supermarkets.  In retrospect, it was like Dr. Zhivago meets Baskin Robbins.  But no more!  In Jeff Robert's book, The Atlas of American Artisan Cheese, he lists 345 different American cheese makers organized by region.

Now I have to confess I have always enjoyed cheese and so France was never far from my mind. And, I tend to prefer goat cheese and because of my genes, DNA and general individual weaknesses goat seems to prefer me too.  But now more than ever, who needs France? And I mean that.  And as with all local foods, the land is the key.  One of the most significant points mentioned by the panelists this evening was how their grass-fed sheep, cows or goats ate what was growing in the fields and how that effects the flavor of the cheese wheel-to-wheel.  So one month the pastures may be clover heavy and that's what you may taste in the cheese.  The next month you may get hints of lavender.  Now some people prefer standardization--think globalization.  Local foods, however, eschews that in a major way.

If you appreciate cheese and local foods and are anti-standardization, I recommend that you buy yourself a guide and start exploring. The Atlas mentioned above is good because it lets you know up front which farms encourage visitors.  One of my favorite day trips is out to Bobolink Dairy in Vernon, New Jersey where they not only make great grass-fed cheese, but you can also step into the small as a breadbox bakery and chat with the baker as he makes small batches of bread in a wood fired oven.

So go out and explore.  And celebrate US farmer's, bakers and cheese makers who are working so hard to secure our food supply and our land.