Cheeses of Spain & Portugal

[Chloe]

Actually just bought some "artisanal" membrillo at El Corte Ingles yesterday, though I haven't tried it.

Chloë

[Bux]

Thanks for the legwork, Bux. I hope that the "check out the fruit pastes" mission didn't cramp your traveling style. (BTW, I remember that article by Hesser; at the time, I thought it was a pretty funny concept. Now I find myself wondering about splurging for tuna-stuffed piquillo peppers at Dean & DeLuca.... Cheaper than a flight to Spain!)

I appreciate your comment that:

"...one is likely to find excellent artisanal quality food products in a rural area where homogenized industrial products have not taken hold of people's tastes."

My fear is that those spots are becoming fewer and farther between....

No thanks due. I'm almost guilty that we didn't go out of our way to do any checking out. My style wasn't cramped at all -- or at least not on your behalf. I would have liked to have spent more time in food shops and in markets, although honestly I did not find anything as interesting in the way of markets as we had in the north. Barcelona may have the best food markets, or at least the best I know. We did make it a point to shop in two markets in Sevilla, our last stop. Regrettably neither was very impressive and one seemed to be on its last legs. Not sure why and can only guess that supermarkets may be having an effect or that the center of the city is not where people shop these days. That Chloe found artisanal membrillo at a Corte Ingles may be telling. I've often found the food shopping in European department stores to be very good. Let me start a new thread on the non membrillo stuff.

[LOS]

It's an aged goat's milk cheese, with a thick coating of dark ash. Comes in logs about 6-7 inches long and a good 1.5 or 2 inches in diameter. Very sharp, almost ammonia-like flavor.

It's pronounced like BAHL-ann-CHAIR-ose. My best guess as to the spelling was Balanceros, but that doesn show many google hits, and none look right.

So what is this stuff?

[Carolyn Tillie]

Wrong name, but what you are describing sounds like:

St. Maure.

[OPJK]

I don't know which cheese that might be, but , from the sound of the name, it might actually be from Valencia as "val" is sometimes pronounced "bval". I'm unfamiliar with valenciaros as a construction, but, who knows?

[Bux]

Wrong name, but what you are describing sounds like:

St. Maure.

St. Maure, and a number of other goat logs from France, are that size and shape, but they rarely have a thick coating of ash and a sharp amonia-like flavor wouldn't be how I would describe them. Then again, they're usually served fairly fresh. Aged long enough and they may well take on an amonia quality. I doubt it's St. Maure and take LOS' word that this is a Spanish cheese.

[Steve Martin]

Sounds like a Spaniard's attempt to say Valencay.

Valencay description

Perhaps it was Spanish, but he was telling you it was like Valencay.

[LOS]

My source says that it's spelled Ballencheres. No google hits at all, though.

[Eric_Malson]

It took a bit of looking (hey, my curiosity was piqued), but I finally found it.

The name of the type of cheese is "Los Balanchares". There's not much info about this cheese on the web (even though one Spanish site proclaims it "the most famous and celebrated cheese of Andalucía"!). It's made in or near the town of Doña Mencía, about 30 miles SE of the city of Córdoba, on the NNW border of the Parque Natural Sierras Subbéticas, in the province of Córdoba. It is indeed a goat's milk cheese, aged in ashes.

The only web pages Google turned up with any background info at all were here and here (both in Spanish).

Edit: A second Google search (leaving out "queso"--the Spanish word for cheese--silly me) produced quite a few more hits, including a site devoted exclusively to Los Balanchares. This shows several types of this cheese, including a more traditional "cake" shape coated in ashes, a kind cured in olive oil, and the ash-coated "log" shape you described. Very strange site. It also apears that Tienda.com may have, at one time, carried this cheese, but they don't seem to currently.

Edited February 3, 2004 by Eric_Malson (log)

[ludja]

Bravo!! I admit I tried a bunch of googling and looking at my cheese books to no avail. Good sleuthing.

[rickmartin]

A note on ammonia: I have tried to solve this delima in the past to no "official" avail. In cheese (my hypothesis) is it's a storage defect that appears in just about any cheese that has been wrapped to tightly with a lot of moisture. My first experience was with a Cabrales blue that had an ammonia content that would wake you from head trauma. This Christmas I was sent a bell of Red Hawk from the Cowgirl Creamery, one of my favorite flavors in the world. I could smell the ammonia before I opened the box (even the UPS guy had complained of the smell in his truck). Since ammonia is a by-product of some (probably anaerobic) bacterial life cycles, I'm thinking it could happen to any cheese improperly stored and should not be used as a trait to describe a particular cheese, but rather it's handling. I made that mistake because it took me a couple of years to try another Cabrales. I missed out.

The Red Hawk, BTW, was fine after a day of airing out. The Cabrales was suffocating so long it was permanently tainted.

Any other comments on this subject? It reminds me of when people thought imported beer was supposed to smell like a skunks ass not knowing it was a flavor defect from light struck hops.

RM

[Bux]

It took a bit of looking (hey, my curiosity was piqued), but I finally found it.

Edit: A second Google search (leaving out "queso"--the Spanish word for cheese--silly me) produced quite a few more hits, including a site devoted exclusively to Los Balanchares.

There should be an eGullet medal for valor beyond the call of duty. Consider yourself a decorated member of this board.

[Bux]

Any other comments on this subject?

I've always associated the odor of ammonia with poorly stored and over the hill Camenbert because I used to run across so many ripe cheeses of that sort being sold in the US. Things are better today. More Americans know what cheese and beer are supposed to taste like and are willing to complain, at least sometimes. I've had a problem with an overripe cheese in NY and I discovered the local merchant was replacing the original expiration dates of the imported cheeses. We had a few words and he defended his practice and defended the ammoniated cheese, but refunded my money. Actually he wanted to offer me a different cheese. I opted for my money back and rarely buy cheese from the shop, although they have one or two reliable cheeses that I buy.

[LOS]

Indeed, great work, Eric.

The ammonia smell/taste was very slight, and seemed to me to be natural part of the cheese (which was, as I said very sharp). You had to get the cheese in your hands and up off the plate before noticing any aroma.

EDITED to add: But then I'd have to taste a pristine sample to know for sure, wouldn't I?

Edited February 3, 2004 by LOS (log)

[rickmartin]

I've ran accross those who defend defects too. Being a chef I was taught all of the good ones early on: When you burn something you call it Cajun, etc. I've often wondered if ammonia is one of those smells undetectable to some. I've waived really strong pieces under sellers noses whom have refused any recognition of the smell. But then I've never thought the cilantro tasted like soap no matter how many times my friend demanded I admit it. I do think some pork products smell like wet dog at times (many good hams) and not many share my olfactory perception.

RM

[Eric_Malson]

But then I'd have to taste a pristine sample to know for sure, wouldn't I?

The obvious solution is to plan a trip to Córdoba immediately.

And take me with you.

[fredbram]

And perhaps they are called the "Foogle" awards, given for great valor and perseverance in the fine art of food googling.

[FaustianBargain]

I have to confess that I know very little about Spanish cheeses. I have had only two, Manchego and El Suspiro. Both made from goat's milk, iirc. I am especially fond of El Suspiro and am in complete agreement with the name assigned to this heavenly cheese.

My question is..what about the cheeses made from cow's milk? Are sheep/goat milk cheeses more popular than cow milk cheeses in Spain? Same with the concept mixed milk cheese. Is it more popular in Spain than..say..in France or Italy?

[butterfly]

The regions most known for cows--and cow milk-- are Cantabria, Asturias and, to a lesser extent, Catalunya.

Manchego is made from sheep's milk (which has a higher fat content than cow milk). Sheep have been a huge part of the Spanish economy for thousands of years, since they do well in the high altitude and dry climate of the Meseta (which produces a wonderfully nutrient-rich and drought resistent grass).

Some of my favorite Spanish cheeses are Idiazabal, La Serena, Zamorano, Gamonedo, Murcia al Vino, Cabrales...

Check out this site for more info:

http://www.cheesefromspain.com

[g_camper]

The regions most known for cows--and cow milk-- are Cantabria, Asturias and, to a lesser extent, Catalunya.

Manchego is made from sheep's milk (which has a higher fat content than cow milk). Sheep have been a huge part of the Spanish economy for thousands of years, since they do well in the high altitude and dry climate of the Meseta (which produces a wonderfully nutrient-rich and drought resistent grass).

Some of my favorite Spanish cheeses are Idiazabal, La Serena, Zamorano, Gamonedo, Murcia al Vino, Cabrales...

Check out this site for more info:

http://www.cheesefromspain.com

←

I am on my way to Spain in another week. I am looking forward to having torta de Casar, about which I have heard a great deal, but have never experienced it. We will be dining one night in Atrio in Caceres, so I hope to get it there with Tono Perez's selection of olive oil with it (he seems to favor vanilla flavored olive oil, per the Relais et Chateau site).

[vserna]

Mahón (the artisanal, cured version), Tetilla, Arzúa-Ulloa, smoked San Simón, Afuega'l pitu, Casín, La Peral, Vidiago, Pido, Garmillas are great cow's milk cheeses - from the soft to the hard ones. For a look at top-notch, modern, artisanal cow's milk cheese in the Catalan Pyrenees, seek out the delicious Brie-like products made by Tros de Sort.

[butterfly]

> delicious Brie-like products made by Tros de Sort

Do you happen to know where I can find this cheese in Madrid?

[vserna]

I first discovered it at one of the Mallorca shops; I've also seen it at El Corte Inglés' Club del Gourmet. But the best source (they have a couple of different cheeses from Tros de Sort) is the new, super-duper cheese shop, Poncelet.

[FaustianBargain]

are there any spanish recipes that incorporate cheese in the dish..other than a sprinkling on top, that is...

[culinary bear]

Yes, there's a Asturian dish of paneed and fried veal cutlets with cabrales sauce, amongst others.

Cabrales is a blue cheese with more mould than paste - it's the most pungent cheese I've ever tasted, including all the washed rind monsters of lore.

I'm surprised no-one's mentione Picos de Europa, sometimes known as Valdeon. Made in the tiny little village of Posada de Valdeon, high in the Picos mountains, it's a mix of cow, sheep and goat milks (depending on season), with a blue-grey mould, wrapped in plane leaves. If I had to describe it with reference to other cheeses, it would be like the centrepoint of a triangle having stilton, roquefort and gorgonzola at the vertices. It's a beautiful cheese.

edited to add : Cows don't do well in the extreme heat of the Central and Southern parts of Spain, but in Cantabria, Asturias and to a lesser extent Galicia they do very well; Asturias is the 'dairy' part of Spain.

Edited March 25, 2005 by culinary bear (log)