Parmesan foam with pears and hazelnuts

In the middle of Turkey Month, otherwise known to some as November, I had the good fortune to be invited to a Parmigiano Reggiano event called Parmigiano Reggiano Academy. At first I wasn't sure I could go. I mean, I was busy researching shipping logistics and fine tuning details for the launch of a particular cheese club (ahem, read here!), trying to work with chefs schedules for writing articles, and, selling wine for Turkey Month at the shop whose wine bar I manage. I was a tad zonked. But then I thought, if I can't take a break for Parmigiano Academy, who am I, really?

If I said no to a night of wine pairing, eating, and tasting the difference between 12, 18, and 36 month-old Parm, I was sure the people handing out cheese geek cards would ask me to turn mine back in. A bigger fear was that they would ask me to turn back in the cape and leotard  I plan to wear to CheeseCon (i.e. the American Cheese Conference). So,... I said yes.

And it was delicious.

My favorite part of the event was the eating. Drinking- also lovely. I arrived, was handed a glass of wine, and we were sent around tables to explore the different Parm ages. I may have hit one table three times.

And then they passed the hors d'oeuvres. Cue holiday party.

Chef Jordan of Jordan's Kitchen created three dishes for the night. My favorite, and my Facebook and instagram followers favorite (says the "like" buttons), was sliced pears, rosemary, hazelnut, and parmesan foam.

This would be a fabulous dish for a holiday party served while people are walking around with a glass of sparkling in their hand. Chef Jordan served it in a ramekin, but I think I might serve it in a shooter glass, and small dice the pears after searing so a spoon isn't needed.

Thank you Parm Academy and Chef Jordan for sharing the recipe! Winter parties are calling. 

Sliced pear with hazelnuts, rosemary and Parmigiano foam

2 pears, ripe but firm to the touch

¼ cup hazelnuts, toasted and chopped

1 ½ teaspoons rosemary, very finely chopped

2-3 tablespoons Balsamic vinegar

4 tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Salt and freshly cracked black pepper to taste

Foam

1 cup cream

1 cup milk

2 cups Parmigiano, coarsely grated

Pinch of nutmeg

Pinch of freshly cracked black pepper

¼ - ½ teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon soy lecithin (INYIB note- deemed optional, but helps keep smooth, if don't use, make as close to serving as possible)

In a saucepan combine the cream, milk, cheese, nutmeg and black pepper and bring to a simmer. Simmer until the cheese is completely melted. Pour the mixture into a blender and puree until smooth. Strain the cheese sauce and season with salt to taste. Measure one and one half cups of the cheese sauce and return it to the saucepan. Stir in the soy lecithin and keep warm (INYIB note- soy lecithin is optional, but helps keep sauce smooth, if don't use, make as close to serving as possible).

Halve and core the pears and then slice them into one-quarter inch pieces (you should have about twenty four slices). Heat two sauté pans over medium heat and coat them with olive oil. Cook the pears on both sides until golden brown, about two minutes per side. Season with salt and black pepper to taste and remove to a paper towel to blot any excess oil. Using a hand held immersion blender, froth the cheese sauce until a nice, frothy foam develops. In a shallow bowl plate a teaspoon or two of the foam and top with a piece of the pear. Using a pastry brush, glaze the pear with a touch of Balsamic vinegar and top with chopped hazelnuts, and a pinch of rosemary.

All photos by Stephanie Secrest.

Lastly, have you heard I launched the "It's Not You, It's Brie" cheese club with Scardello Cheese? True story. Read more here.

Thanksgiving Recipes: Butternut Alpine Soufflé & Blue Cheese Spoonbread

Just because it's time for our annual harvest parties and Thanksgiving celebrations doesn't mean that cheese needs to be left on the appetizer tray. Our favorite fermented milk product knows how to strut its stuff during the main course too.

I wanted to share with you two of my most-Thanksgiving-ey recipes. Not that I don't cook these as soon as the heat drops below 70 in the Bay Area (you know, around October to November) too. They're crowd friendly recipes and filled with things that people adore during harvest- sweet potatoes, butternut squash, corn, nutmeg, and, of course, butter. Yay, butter.

I hope you have a wonderful time celebrating this years harvest, and that you can make a little time between planning turkey cooking times and pouring Aunt Nelly her third White Russian to down to sit down and think of things and people for which you can be thankful. Best in Cheese.

Butternut squash and sweet potato Alpine cheese soufflé-casserole (top photo)

Sweet potatoes, butternut squash and brown butter have always been food pairing buddies. Add leeks and sweet and buttery semi-soft Alpine-style cheese to them, and you’ve got a rich Thanksgiving dish that could knock Aunt Lola’s sweet-potato marshmallow casserole out of the water (better set them on different ends of the table so Lola doesn’t hear them compared much). This dish is a casserole-soufflé hybrid. It’s a classic hot dish in that it’s heavy in (sweet potatoes) and cheese, but the addition of two eggs makes it rise a bit higher than the normal casserole. It wouldn’t say it’s light, per se, but it’s certainly rich and fluffy. Especially good with brussel sprout salad a couple days after Thanksgiving.

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

1 ½ pound butternut squash, cut in half lengthwise

¾ pound sweet potato

3 ½ tablespoons salted butter

1 ½ pounds leek, untrimmed

½ teaspoon salt

pinch cardamom

pinch nutmeg

4 ounces, or ½ cups shredded Alpine-style cheese

2 eggs, beaten

¼ teaspoon ground pepper

Directions

 Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Place a sheet pan with curved sides topped with half a tablespoon of butter in the oven. Season the inside of the squash with salt and pepper. Once the butter is melted, lay the squash facedown on the buttered tray and return to the oven. Pierce the sweet potatoes with a fork six times and add them to the oven, resting directly on the racks. Cook both until pierced easily with a fork- about forty-five minutes to an hour for the squash, and thirty to forty-five minutes for the potato.

While the squash and potatoes cook, slice off the bottom of the leeks. Cut off and discard the top dark green part, about four or five inches from the bottom, and the roots. Slice the remaining leek lengthwise, then width-wise, half an inch thick. Wash well under running water to rid the leek of any debris.

Melt two and a half tablespoons of butter in a medium-sized sauté pan and melt over medium heat. Scraping the bottom of the pan for about three to five minutes, cook until the butter turns light brown. If butter foams while browning, take off heat and stir until foam subsides so you can see the brown bits aren’t getting too dark, then return to heat until the butter is walnut-hued. Add the leeks, ¼ teaspoon salt, cardamom, nutmeg, and cook for ten minutes. Set aside.

Once squash and potatoes are cooked and cool enough to touch, scrape out their interiors (discard the skins) and run through a food mill or processor into a large bowl. Add the leeks and browned-butter mixture, grated cheese, eggs, and the remaining salt, ground pepper. Mix well. Spoon into a heavy-bottomed 8 x 8 baking dish greased with the remaining ½ tablespoon butter and bake for twenty to thirty minutes, until the top turns golden. Cool for five minutes and serve.

Bacon blue cheese spoonbread

Noted by the stalks of dried, multi-colored corn gracing tables for Thanksgiving decorations, just one of the many things the Native Americans taught the Pilgrims was how to grow corn. Although November is too late to serve fresh the fresh vegetable, I like to utilize dried and frozen corn at Thanksgiving to honor the importance of this vegetable. When cornbread sounds a little too dry or I want something a little richer, I go straight for spoonbread. A custardy, pudding-like corn bread inspired dish, spoonbread is a Southern delicacy commonly served topped with melted butter. I like to use bacon and blue cheese in my version, and offer guests additional butter if they want something richer. Served topped with a fried egg, this spoonbread is great the morning after too.

Ingredients

4 pieces bacon

2 cups buttermilk

½ cup water

1 cup masa harina or corn flour

½ teaspoon salt

2 ½ tablespoons salted butter

2 eggs, beaten

10 ounces frozen corn kernels, at room temperature

6 ounces blue cheese

freshly ground pepper

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Place the bacon on an ungreased sheet pan and bake for fifteen minutes, or until cooked and lightly crispy. Remove from pan, slice into small pieces, and bring the oven to 400 degrees.

Bring one cup of the buttermilk, the water, masa harina, and salt to a boil, whisking to avoid clumps. Simmer for two minutes while whisking. Add two tablespoons butter and remove from heat.

Whisk together the remaining cup of buttermilk and the eggs in a large bowl. Add this mixture slowly to the cooked masa harina and stir well. Add the corn kernels. Pour into a 8 x 8 baking dish greased with the last of the butter and dot the top with crumbled blue cheese. Cook for thirty-five to forty-five minutes until the top starts to brown and the spoonbread no longer jiggles. Let rest before serving.

Halloween Cheese: From Moo to Boo

Halloween and cheese may not seem like the most natural combination in the world, but look where chocolate and sea salt were five years ago. Who would have thought that today they would have become as sexy of a pairing as duck fat and potatoes or Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie? Not me, but oh my, how I am now in love. Halloween and cheese are destined to become such an exalted pairing. I see it in the cards.

By the way, you know what doesn't go with Halloween? Raisins. Unless they're chocolate covered. Now that that's out of my system, from moo to boo.

Here are links to my favorite cheese and halloween ideas, with a few harvest-ey recipes thrown in for good measure.

Spooky Ghost Pizza Recipe

Tomato soup and cheesy toast recipe

Pumpkin Face Quesadilla

 Dianne's Pumpkin Cookie Cups Filled with a Cream Cheese Filling

Monster Fingers and Pimento Cheese Paws

Savory Pumpkin Puffs

Pumpkin Soup with Gruyere

And.... a short list of amazingly orange artisan cheese for your festive plate:

Red Rock by Dunbarton Blue, and Mimolette,

Any cheesy Halloween plans for you readers? I'm going to a bash with a friend as Bonny and Clyde. Yup, I'm a total geek for dressing up in period pieces. My friend didn't want to wear my Def Leopard shirt and rat her hair, but still wanted do a partner custome, so obviously this was our only option.

Cheese & Wine Classes for June: Spring Fever

Next week I'll kick off a cheese series that will feature three of my favorite finds I've been snacking on lately. But, before that, I want to make sure you know about some upcoming classes I'm teaching in June. Because I'd love to see you there!

In honor of the cheesiness that has already come and the deliciousness that is yet to happen, I'm including some pics of a recent cheese class I  taught at the Cheese School of San Francisco. The topic - Spring Sparklers. Just some of our favorite pairings from the Spring Sparklers class: Harley Farms Monet with Sommariva Prosecco, Vermont Butter & Cheese Bonne Bouche and NV Bailly-Lapierre Cremant de Bourgogne, Meadow Creek's Grayson and German Gilabert Brut Rosat

Hope to see you soon!

UPCOMING CLASSES:

Shepherds, Transhumance and Volcanoes: Mountain Cheeses & Wines, 18 Reasons, San Francisco, June 5th

Despite treacherous climbs and threats of volcanic eruption, people have been making cheese and wine on some of the most mountainous and volcanic regions around the world for centuries. And not just because the views are picturesque.

Cheese and wine educator Kirstin Jackson, who's publishing a book on cheese called "It's Not You, It's Brie: Unwrapping America's Unique Culture of Cheese" this November, will reveal who, why, and how people craft some of the finest cheeses and wines around on uneven or even dangerous ground.

The cheeses will be vibrant, the wines will be weird, and the class will be delicious.

Summer Cheese & Wine, Cheese School of San Francisco , June 20th

In summer, foodie daydreams linger on sunshine, fabulous cheese, and thirst-quenching wines. ‘It’s Not You, It’s Brie,’ blogger and oenophile Kirstin Jackson will lead you in a fantasy tasting of summer’s best. Think fresh and just ripe cheeses and light, fun wines. You’ll find some pairings to inspire your summer gatherings.

Also, am very happy to announce that I'll be co-teaching a beer & cheese pairing class with the AMAZING Nicole Erny soon. Check her out- the only female master ciccrone in the country, and 1 of 4 in the world. By the way, she's not even 30. Keep posted. I'll announce the class here. Summer and fall classes coming soon.....

Burrata Plea: Consider Fall. And Winter. And Finter.

As the weather grows colder in the rest of the country (the San Francisco bay area just seems to be getting hotter, let's leave us out of this), I've been reminded of one burrata thing. Burrata is not seasonal. Believe it or not, my summer caprese salad lovers, people make burrata in the fall. Even the winter. Sometimes even in that period between the two, known as finter.

This post is a plea to keep the burrata love going.

Burrata, a fresh cheese from Southern Italy, is mozzarella on another level. It is a freshly stuffed sheet of mozzarella wrapped around mozzarella curds mixed with cream. Yes, cream. It is a great big fun ball of delicious creaminess. It is nearly impossible not to like. Most who do not like burrata also do not like puppies or kittens, even if they don't have to take care of them.

Over the summer I've had some great burratas around town- this is the time that chefs seem to serve it. Burrata loves tomatoes. Tomatoes love burratas. But a good burrata also likes other foods not in the nightshade family.

Three of my favorite burratas (all local- burrata is so fresh that it can go bad within days, so I get it as near home as I can) complete this post. But first, here are a few suggestions on how to keep the burrata love going past the summer season. Because it deserves it. Don't pull away.

In general, I'm okay with putting almost anything delicious with burrata as an appetizer. But always keep this cheese itself simple. If you doll up some veggies to go with it, spice the veggies, not the cheese. Just drizzle the burrata with olive oil, sprinkle with sea salt and freshly ground pepper. It is easily overwhelmed. This goes for all pairing suggestions below.

Figs- Either use fresh figs or reconsitute dried figs in wine poaching liquid (see picture above).

Roasted root vegetables- Serve burrata over a bed of warm roasted butternut sqaush and carrots cooked with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and thyme.

Bruschetta- Spoon over grilled or toasted bread rubbed with olive oil and a garlic clove.

Persimmons- Top a persimmon-frisée salad dressed in a tarragon and lemon vinaigrette with this cheese. Sprinkle with pomegranate seeds for crunch.

Garbanzo beans- Top chick peas dressed with rosemary, time and garlic with oil-cured black olives and burrata.

Three of my faves:

Gioia: The first local one I tried, from San Diego. A thin mozzarella sheet wraps the curds in tight. Comes in a one pound tub. Yes, you can eat all of it.

Maplebrook: Pictured above, from Vermont. This one has a thicker mozz shell than the Gioia and a slightly looser curd, and is just as delicious. Comes packed in water.

Di Stefano It also oozes in the right places. From southern California

How do you like serving your burrata? Any locals that you love?