Antonelli's Cheese Shop
Объяснительная. Это недавно открывшийся в Остине магазин сыров, ну, сырный бутик. Крошечный магазинчик. Им владеют сырные маньяки. Все сыры можно пробовать в самом магазине. Они постоянно устраивают всякие сырные мероприятия. И они поставляют сыры лучшим поварам города. Я подписана на их рассылку. Когда получила первое их письмо, то даже взялась его переводить, чтобы поделиться в блоге. Потом передумала. Потом вернула стёртое и перевела до конца. Потом опять всё стёрла. Перевод что-то убивает. Но мне хочется эти тексты сохранить. Эти люди и эти тексты просто близки мне по духу. Поэтому, я буду размещать их письма под катом по мере получения, коллекционировать.
Bon Fromage Ali!
Our First Farewell to a Cheesemonger
(Otherwise titled Ali's Favorite Things...)
Hi there cheese fans,
As my time at Antonelli's draws near its end, I'm getting all nostalgic thinking of the fabulous things that I've learned and devoured during the past few months. For those of you who don't know, I began working at the shop a few months ago as what can only be described as a "biochemical cheesetern." After walking into the shop one day and having a unexpectedly in-depth conversation about cheese with John, the Antonelli's decided to bring me on as an intern. My role as such was to learn as much as humanly possible about cheese through tasting and reading as well as the guidance of the ultra-knowledgeable staff while returning the favor by putting my biochem degree to work and schooling everybody on the sciency goings-on behind the scenes with cheese. I eventually switched to full cheesmonger status and have been helping to spread the word of good cheese ever since.
Next Friday, August 13, will be my last day at the cheese shop, and the Antonellis have requested that I share a few of my favorite cheeses as a kind of send-off before I head back to my hometown of Denver, CO to pursue a career in food science and eventually (fingers crossed) a PhD in food biochemistry. None of the cheeses below are necessarily new arrivals, but they are the ones that I am definitely going to miss the most when I head home.
Mozzarella Burrata
Simply put, this cheese was responsible for one of the greatest meals I have ever eaten. This cheese has already appeared in email blasts before and will probably repeatedly appear on your radar again and again. Imagine the most moist, succulent mozzarella you have ever tasted. Ok, now stretch that sucker out real thin and stuff it with enough cream-loaded curd to leave a taut, ready-to burst ball of insanity once it arrives at your table. This cheese makes me want to throw many big-chain pizza joints in front of the UN to testify for crimes against humanity, otherwise known as pawning off a stringy, white, Elmer's glue taste-a-like to the American public and calling it mozzarella. That it should even be allowed to share the same name as the tub of ooey delight that comes from Gioia artisan cheese in L.A. seems a near-blasphemous offense to me. In short, buy this cheese, bring it to parties, make LOTS of new friends.
Valdeon
My favorite blue, this cheese strikes a chord deep down in my soul after having visited the Picos de Europa mountain range in northwestern Spain that provide a dramatic, pastoral backdrop for the farms that produce this cheese. Leon, the province in which this cheese is made, boasts a mild climate that is legendary among European foodies for providing the perfect conditions for the curing of Spanish charcuterie. Obviously, this same climate also lends itself well to the maturation of cheese; Valdeon has a warm, dark, salty flavor all its own that goes well with any meaty or nutty flavor profile. I once included it in a taco with red-wine marinated fajita, caramelized onions, and roasted walnuts that was so ridiculously good that upon writing this sentence I have just decided to revisit the idea tomorrow night for dinner.
Pure Luck Feta
Again, this cheese sings to me in a deeply personal way. Growing up as a second-generation Iranian meant growing up eating delicious Iranian food prepared by my dad for which I feel incredibly lucky. The quintessential Iranian breakfast is called noon o paneer (or "bread with cheese" in Persian). I remember waking up as a kid and enjoying warm pita bread with cold, salty feta garnished with everything from honey to fresh herbs like purple basil from the garden or even leftover shish kabob from the night before. We would have one large platter in the middle of the table and everyone would serve themselves by grabbing the cheese with a piece of bread. Give it a try and suddenly that McEggwhich won't seem as enticing!
Croque au Sel
I know, I know, this isn't a cheese. But I don't care. This beautiful ash-gray sea salt is my go-to tool for illustrating the fact that salt can actually have a flavor of its own to the huddled masses of salt-avoiding nonbelievers out there. This salt tastes as though it were scraped off of the shores of a giant sea of olive oil; it has a smooth, almost unctuous olive flavor on the front end that gives way to a delightful punch of perfectly controlled salty sumptuosity (not a real word, I know, but it feels right). Its large, crunchy crystals are a phenomenal finishing agent for any dish (see burrata above). My favorite way to use it lately has been a salad of endive, arugula, white onion and baby spinach with a lemon/apple cider vinaigrette, coarse ground black pepper (fresh, please) and toasted sesame seeds. I stole this recipe from a chef at a hostel in Lisbon, try it and maybe you will wake up tomorrow speaking Portuguese.
Well folks, that's about all I have to offer. I hope that after I am gone you all will continue to support Antonelli's; they can't resist treating everyone like family and giving way more insight into the cheese world than would ever be expected of a simple shopping experience. Now that I think about it, they could probably put an alligator-filled moat in front of the door, and the cheese would still fly out of here.
I hope you all enjoyed my homage to fromage,
Ali Bouzari
(& John, Kendall, Kelly, & Michael)
Antonelli's Cheese Shop
4220 Duval Street
Austin, TX 78751
www.antonellischeese.com
Bon Fromage Ali!
Our First Farewell to a Cheesemonger
(Otherwise titled Ali's Favorite Things...)
Hi there cheese fans,
As my time at Antonelli's draws near its end, I'm getting all nostalgic thinking of the fabulous things that I've learned and devoured during the past few months. For those of you who don't know, I began working at the shop a few months ago as what can only be described as a "biochemical cheesetern." After walking into the shop one day and having a unexpectedly in-depth conversation about cheese with John, the Antonelli's decided to bring me on as an intern. My role as such was to learn as much as humanly possible about cheese through tasting and reading as well as the guidance of the ultra-knowledgeable staff while returning the favor by putting my biochem degree to work and schooling everybody on the sciency goings-on behind the scenes with cheese. I eventually switched to full cheesmonger status and have been helping to spread the word of good cheese ever since.
Next Friday, August 13, will be my last day at the cheese shop, and the Antonellis have requested that I share a few of my favorite cheeses as a kind of send-off before I head back to my hometown of Denver, CO to pursue a career in food science and eventually (fingers crossed) a PhD in food biochemistry. None of the cheeses below are necessarily new arrivals, but they are the ones that I am definitely going to miss the most when I head home.
Mozzarella Burrata
Simply put, this cheese was responsible for one of the greatest meals I have ever eaten. This cheese has already appeared in email blasts before and will probably repeatedly appear on your radar again and again. Imagine the most moist, succulent mozzarella you have ever tasted. Ok, now stretch that sucker out real thin and stuff it with enough cream-loaded curd to leave a taut, ready-to burst ball of insanity once it arrives at your table. This cheese makes me want to throw many big-chain pizza joints in front of the UN to testify for crimes against humanity, otherwise known as pawning off a stringy, white, Elmer's glue taste-a-like to the American public and calling it mozzarella. That it should even be allowed to share the same name as the tub of ooey delight that comes from Gioia artisan cheese in L.A. seems a near-blasphemous offense to me. In short, buy this cheese, bring it to parties, make LOTS of new friends.
Valdeon
My favorite blue, this cheese strikes a chord deep down in my soul after having visited the Picos de Europa mountain range in northwestern Spain that provide a dramatic, pastoral backdrop for the farms that produce this cheese. Leon, the province in which this cheese is made, boasts a mild climate that is legendary among European foodies for providing the perfect conditions for the curing of Spanish charcuterie. Obviously, this same climate also lends itself well to the maturation of cheese; Valdeon has a warm, dark, salty flavor all its own that goes well with any meaty or nutty flavor profile. I once included it in a taco with red-wine marinated fajita, caramelized onions, and roasted walnuts that was so ridiculously good that upon writing this sentence I have just decided to revisit the idea tomorrow night for dinner.
Pure Luck Feta
Again, this cheese sings to me in a deeply personal way. Growing up as a second-generation Iranian meant growing up eating delicious Iranian food prepared by my dad for which I feel incredibly lucky. The quintessential Iranian breakfast is called noon o paneer (or "bread with cheese" in Persian). I remember waking up as a kid and enjoying warm pita bread with cold, salty feta garnished with everything from honey to fresh herbs like purple basil from the garden or even leftover shish kabob from the night before. We would have one large platter in the middle of the table and everyone would serve themselves by grabbing the cheese with a piece of bread. Give it a try and suddenly that McEggwhich won't seem as enticing!
Croque au Sel
I know, I know, this isn't a cheese. But I don't care. This beautiful ash-gray sea salt is my go-to tool for illustrating the fact that salt can actually have a flavor of its own to the huddled masses of salt-avoiding nonbelievers out there. This salt tastes as though it were scraped off of the shores of a giant sea of olive oil; it has a smooth, almost unctuous olive flavor on the front end that gives way to a delightful punch of perfectly controlled salty sumptuosity (not a real word, I know, but it feels right). Its large, crunchy crystals are a phenomenal finishing agent for any dish (see burrata above). My favorite way to use it lately has been a salad of endive, arugula, white onion and baby spinach with a lemon/apple cider vinaigrette, coarse ground black pepper (fresh, please) and toasted sesame seeds. I stole this recipe from a chef at a hostel in Lisbon, try it and maybe you will wake up tomorrow speaking Portuguese.
Well folks, that's about all I have to offer. I hope that after I am gone you all will continue to support Antonelli's; they can't resist treating everyone like family and giving way more insight into the cheese world than would ever be expected of a simple shopping experience. Now that I think about it, they could probably put an alligator-filled moat in front of the door, and the cheese would still fly out of here.
I hope you all enjoyed my homage to fromage,
Ali Bouzari
(& John, Kendall, Kelly, & Michael)
Antonelli's Cheese Shop
4220 Duval Street
Austin, TX 78751
www.antonellischeese.com