Re: Query re bleu cheese

[Guest guest]

> Based on references in NT and other materials put out by WAPF, I've

gotten

> the impression that Maytag bleu is, by definition, a raw milk cheese.

> Otherwise it wouldn't be called Maytag.

>

> Is this true?

MFJ,

http://mag.leftcoastart.com/html/farmstead_cheeses.html

" Maytag Dairy Farms-Jim s, Newton, Iowa

Nobody believes me when I tell them, but Maytag Blue is made by the

same family who started the famous washing machine company. It's true.

They also own Anchor Steam beer. The cheese is one of the premier

American cheeses and one of the worlds' best blues-sharp and a tad

salty with a wonderfully fruity, peppery blue flavor. It is the ideal

blue cheese for a mixed greens salad or over a grilled burger.

Picture

Each 4-pound wheel is handmade from unpasteurized cow's milk from

their award-winning Holstein-Friesian cows, which graze on 1,600 acres

of beautiful Iowa countryside. The curd is hand-seeded with

Penicillium roqueforti, then hand-ladled into hoops, hand-salted and

aged for six months, twice as long as most, in cellars carved into the

side of a hill on the farm. Each wheel is inspected and turned

separately every week in the curing cave.

President and Farm Manager Jim s began work on the farm when he

was 18-years-old, scrubbing the mold off the cheeses, and has now been

with Maytag for almost fifty-two years. He speaks of the Farms with

great pride and affection.

Maytag also makes a wonderful white cheddar and, not available all of

the time, a superb, tangy goat blue and goat edam. Mail-order still

accounts for about 50% of Maytag sales. "

Gee, I'm gettin hungry.

FWIW I believe blue cheese contains gluten.

B.

[Guest guest]

> Buuttttttttttt ... does this family protect their trademark? I

> guess the question *really* is: What is the likelihood that things

> marketed as " Maytag Blue " really ARE the real thing? (As opposed to,

> say, " in the Maytag style " ... which could mean anything, not just

whether

> it's raw or not heh.)

Well, MFJ,

I may have been mistaken in assuming you were alluding to a cheese

with an obvious " Maytag " label on it. OK. I think it's *fairly* safe

to assume a farmstead-type cheese someone as discriminating as

yourself would consider for purchase--that was blue/bleu--would be a

raw cheese.

Caveat: check for the words " made in China " somewhere on the label?

B.

/oh, I give up