Mr NQN and I usually spend our weekends researching and eating food. Lots of it I should add. And sometimes, if we’re very lucky the weekend will involve getting out and seeing our fair city as well as foraging for food. Sometimes we’re lucky enough to combine the two.
Allow me to rewind. RedBalloon were kind enough to offer Mr NQN and I a spot in the McIntosh Bowman cheese and wine tasting workshops on picturesque Fort Denison. Within the space of two hours we would be taught all sorts of fascinating things about cheese and wine and be introduced or reacquainted with twelve of Australia’s best farmhouse cheeses.
We meet at 11:45am by the sign and Claudia introduces herself. She is the McIntosh half of McIntosh & Bowman the cheesemongers and a self confessed “curd nerd” who has travelled the world making cheese with some of the top names in the cheese world (and did you know that there is a Cheese Olympics in Lyon?). She explains that we will be catching the noon ferry over to Fort Denison where we will taste cheeses and wines against the historical setting of Fort Denison. The last time Mr NQN and I visited Fort Denison was for Mother’s Day and we had taken a peek inside the cheese tasting room after lunch.
The sun isn’t quite cooperating today and we take the very short 5 minute boat trip across the water past the Harbour Bridge on the left and the Opera House to the right. We arrive at Fort Denison to a glass of sparkling wine and there is at first a run down on Fort Denison etiquette by the National Parks person as the entire island is heritage listed and then it’s onto the canapes!
Today’s canapes are had in the main grassy area at the top. To one side is the tower and to the other side is the lovely albeit rainy and windy harbour view. We start with some fresh Sydney rock oysters with lemon which are just the best way to orient yourself with the harbour.
Our next canape is the beetroot cured salmon on crouton toasts which is utterly moreish. In fact if we weren’t about to go back in to start the tasting I might have asked for more!
We make our way down to the tasting room. At each of our places is a plate of 12 cheeses-11 Australian and 1 Italian cheese. There are also two discs of “Pastilla Nash” which is a prune and walnut log which is handmade in Sydney and sells in 14 countries around the world. There are also freshly baked Infinity sourdough bread rolls in the centre of the table and four glasses of wine to have with the cheeses as well as a water and a glass for beer. All of the cheeses that we are tasting are top of the range with none less than $90 a kilo.
We’re asked to introduce ourselves to everyone and name our favourite cheeses. Everyone’s answers vary from tasty to triple brie and I find it hard to narrow it down to just one cheese or even two so I mention the Holy Goat La Luna cheese and burrata which is my current obsession. And fortuitously a sister to the Holy Goat La Luna is on the menu today! All of the cheeses are classified as farmhouse cheese and in this case, it means that they’re made in small, artisinal batches. They are a mix of the four types of milk: cow, goat, sheep and buffalo. There are also large batch farmhouse cheeses like roquefort and parmesan but these are also made to strict standards and regulations but these weren’t part of this tasting.
And why Fort Denison as a setting? Well cattle of course are not indigenous to Australia and in 1788 when they were first brought over, there were five cows (apparently some pregnant) and two bulls. They were loaded onto the sandbank which is now known as Bennelong Point but was then called Cattle Point. The cattle were here in make shift enclosures where the Opera House now stands. They did get loose and ended up wandering away and were found as far away as Camden which was then called “cow pasture” because Claudia tells us “cows were found fat and happy, feeding on green pastures having multiplied to a herd of 40 in the time in which they had gone missing!”
Claudia tells us that there are theories as to how cheese was originally discovered and one holds that a shepherd accidentally discovered cheese. Back in the day, every part of an animal was used including it’s stomach which was washed, dried and oiled and the shepherd may have used that to store some of his herd’s milk. The heat from the sun, the movement of the walking and the enzymes present in the stomach would have quite possbily given the first taste of cheese!
There are essentially seven types of cheese: fresh (mozzarella, ricotta), bloomy (brie or camembert), washed (fire engine red), semi hard (Jarlsberg), hard pressed (reggiano), blue veined (gorgonzola) and processed (in this case one rolled in ash or fruit, they’re not going to serve us Kraft singles!). Claudia suggests that we try the cheeses using our fingers for the full experience although a knife is given to us.
The four wines are a NZ Semillon Sauignon Blanc, a Mudgee Pinot Gris, a Langham Creek Moscato (which is very light and lightly sparkling) and a Margaret River Two Brothers Cabernet Merlot.
The first three cheeses we are given are fresh cheeses and they are a Paesanella mozzarella made of buffalo milk which is made in Marrickville in Sydney. With each cheese she asks us to pick them up with our hands and smell them before tasting them. Interestingly, she tells us that this cheese is made for melting and the best way to tell if a cheese is made for melting is if there is an oily residue that comes out from it once it is melted then it is not made for melting!
The second cheese the Meredith feta made with sheep’s milk from Meredith Valley in Victoria. It has that distinct lanoliney aroma to a sheep milk cheese and pairs nicely with the sauvignon blanc and moscato. Claudia tells us that in Greece, they eat the feta less salty than we do. When they export it over here they add extra salt to preserve it and that we should rinse our feta before consuming it. Overseas they remark that we seem to like our feta salty!
The third fresh cheese is called Jannei Buche Noir made of goat’s milk in Lidsdale in NSW. Jannei is simply a combining of the two farmers names Janet and Neil and they have 120 goats on their Lidsdale property in the Blue Mountains. It has a “faux rind” in that it is rolled in vegetable ash to give it flavour. Interestingly it is wonderful paired with the moscato and made the lightly sparkling dessert wine even more effervescent.
Claudia then brings out the Pale Ale Coopers beer as she tells us that beer and cheese is also a good match. Our fourth cheese is the Holy Goat Matured Skyla goat’s milk cheese with the bloomy, wrinkled rind and soft, even interior. It is also the most expensive cheese in Australia. It’s wonderfully creamy and moreish and I accidentally ate my whole piece before I realise that we are to keep one half to have with chocolate. Yes cheese and chocolate together! These bloomy cheeses are the oppposite to blue cheeses in that they ripen from the outside in whereas with blue cheeses, the ripening is done on the inside out.
The three camemberts
Our next three cheeses are all camemberts. Now can you see the difference between the camemberts? If you said that two are white and one is yellow then you’re right. All cow’s milk cheeses are yellow where goat, buffalo and sheep cheeses are white. The first camembert is an Udder Delights goat’s milk camembert. The second is a Barossa Valley Cheese Co. La Petit Prince goats milk cheese from Angaston in SA and the third is a Woodside McLaren camembert cheese made from jersey cow milk. The Australian camemberts usually have a more sterile and chloriney flavour than the French camemberts which have an aroma akin to steamed cauliflower.
The McLaren camembert in all of its oozy glory
Which brings us to the question what’s the difference between brie and camembert? Well in Australia very little difference at all. Claudia tells us of Normandy cheese makers being horrified when they saw how camembert was made here. But in France there are huge differences between the two and Claudia cites the difference between a camembert from Normandy “to be far more vegetal, mushroomy, meaty with a defined aroma and flavour of cauliflower than the wonderful, lactic, grassy farmhouse milky-ness of a classic brie.” Like Champagne, that is how we aren’t allowed to call anything made outside the strictures of French Champagne that name, in the future camembert will change too.
Our next cheese is another favourite that I discovered in Tasmania recently. It’s a Pyengana cheddar made from cow’s milk which is wrapped in cloth so that the cloth goes moldy. It goes well with the beer and the bread it is almost what you would consider a Ploughman’s lunch. And can we eat the rind of cheeses? Absolutely, with the exception of wax cheeses and cloth bound cheeses and it’s up to you whether you want to eat the very hard rind of a reggiano cheese.
Another thing to consider is ageing your own cheese or becoming an affineur. This is a job in France where people buy cheeses from the cheesemakers and then age it themselves. They are the ones that you may have seen inserting the metal tool into the cheese and taking it out with a small taste of the cheese. Currently there aren’t any well known affineurs here in Australia.
Our next cheese before we get to the blues is a washed rind cheese called Old Telegraph Road Fire Engine Red made with cow’s milk. The most common reaction when smelling this cheese is “It smells like the Easter show!” which in fact it truly does. Claudia also recommends sipping water after trying a cheese as it can also help to identity the different flavour profiles of the bacteria.
Chocolate ganache
She brings us a square of buttery chocolate ganache which we are to cut into quarters. First to taste on its own and then each piece in equal sizes to have with the Holy Goat matured Skyla cheese and the last two cheeses which are the two blues. One is a Tarwin blue cow’s milk cheese from Berry’s Creek in Victoria and the other is an Italian gorgonzola matured in limestone caves with a pineapple aroma to it. I really enjoy the ganache with the holy goat cheese but I find it packs too much of a punch with the blues which I prefer with something sweet like a quince paste and crackers. The pastilla nash is stronger in walnuts than prunes so this doesn’t quite showcase the blue cheeses as I like to eat them.
Well that was a lot of cheese wasn’t it? Some people walk off the cheese by going on a tour of the island, some stay and chat to each other and Claudia. So what did we think of it? If you’re into the history and background of cheese in addition to the tasting then this event could be worth your while. Tickets are $170 per person (including ferry tickets) so it isn’t the an inexpensive experience but as far as cheese eating pleasure and knowledge and eating cheese of this calibre goes it is a treat.
So tell me Dear Reader, what is your favourite cheese?
NQN and Mr NQN attended the class as guests of RedBalloon.
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50 Comments | Add your own
Ooooh, love cheeses. My favourite is D’Affinois, a creamy soft cheese from France. It’s magic served with the Olive and Rosemary bread from Brasserie Bread.
‘stomach which was washed, dried and oiled’?? Wow. Slightly gross, but hey ho you gotta make do!
That brie, on the other hand, does look divine
There is no way I can narrow my favourite cheese down to one!! There are just too many. I can leave chocolate, and cake….but put a cheese platter in front of me and well that’s a whole other story!
Such a fan of cheese – this looks amazing. We are very lucky in the UK to have a few affineurs in particular I love La Fromagerie in Marylebone – you will have to check it out next time you are in London.
what a fun event…the cheese platter is gorgeous, I wish I could try them…I enjoyed the pictures as well. Have a wonderful week ahead Lorraine
This looks like such fun! I have Fort Denison on my list of “must do” experiences. Funny that the place where the Opera House is was once a cow paddock! My favourite cheese is camembert – love its smooth richness.
Oh yum – especially the oozy camembert!!! And I love how they are generous tastings too!
It’s been too long since I had me a cheese plate…
I absolutely adore brie, mild brie with gorgeous crispbread or lavish and a glass of red mmm
What a fun time. I think it’s so wonderful that you and the mr enjoy the same things and have so much fun together!
I can’t wait to have my baby, as I have been dying to eat some cheeses again. Im going to have the biggest cheese plate ever
Blue, camembert, brie I’ve missed them all!
What a fantastic way to spend time on a weekend morning! Rainy and windy or not! Thanks for the lesson, Lorraine – this one will be filed for my eternity! Fascinating info! I adore a very soft and runny brie, but have been enraptured by the strongest of Brit blue cheeses, especially after a classic roast beef/’Y'shire pud meal!
Five sleeps to go
!
Oh I love camembert! Its def my fave. Its a shame the weather wasnt great but i think with the old buildings on the island its quite fitting
What an awesome day! Cheese heaven – I want to go there
My favourite cheese is blue vein – all kinds. I love it with quince paste.
wowww those cheeses look so yummy~! I don’t know why, but I’m becoming a cheesehead lately haha. It’s amazing and sweet to see that you and your husband are so alike and he supports you!
Glad you enjoyed it as much as we did. Pity you didn’t have the Normandy one to try too as when we went it provided a really good comparison. So delicious! I feel like doing another one, yummo!!
I’m a gorganzola girl. Love love love it. My daughter hates it, as did I when I was little! Fantastic post Lorraine, sounds like a wonderful way to spend some time.
My favourite has to be camembert -that photo of the super creamy one had my mouth watering. I could eat a whole wheel if I was allowed!
That is amazing, you are so lucky, i am having another depressed moment that revolves around the fact i have no life at the moment! Oneday i will hopefully be able to do this sort of stuff.
Oh my goodness, what I wouldn’t give to be a cheesemonger, lol! Looks like it was pretty fantastic, Lorraine…and it’s very cool that your fav cheese was on the menu!
Fresh Asiago is absolutely my all time favourite cheese. It’s mild and creamy and perfect with fresh Italian bread and corella pears…… Hmmmm think I have entree for Mothers Day lunch sorted!
I love brie with Merlot…but I do believe I’d dig it even more with CHOCOLATE
xx
I just had the Holy Goat La Luna at Becasse the other night as part of a degustation dinner. I really enjoyed the cheese and the whole dinner was amazing!
So much cheese – and that has to be the runniest Camembert ever! I confess that I’m partial to soft, surface-ripened Bries and Camemberts, though blues taste lovely in salads.
My favourite cheese is cambozola. But I also love truffled brie. Mmm…drooling now after looking at all the cheese on your plate!
OMG the camembert is pure food porn!
I never used to like cheese but am slowly learning to enjoy different varieties, anything really strong on the palette is a turn off for me though but I don’t mind a little bit of blue cheese here and there. Looks like a fab experience.
I actually think this is what haven must look like. Glorious, glorious sstinky cheese, and then chocolate to boot? Heaven.
my favourites are goat and blue cheeses – stinkier the better
(Actually, I just remember I have a blue in my fridge right now, which expires halfway through May, and therefore must be at its peak right now! Woot!)
What a yummy experience! Love most cheeses (apart from blue) but my favourite is probably a nice camembert.
I LOOOOOVE CHEESE! Frank calls me Cheesehead I love cheese so much. My favorite is any blue-veined, expecially a blue-brie. YUM!
Pecorino is the cheese made around us here in Bagni di Lucca and I love it. We can buy dozens of varieties even at our local supermarket and many more at the gorgeous delis. The only cheese I don’t like is goat’s cheese. I can’t stand it.
Oh my god I so want that cheese plate! I love cheese! That looks like a great experience.
To: Debra Kolkka – the very lucky you!!! OK – goat’s cheese – it also was quite repulsive to me when I first met it: perhaps it was the ‘wet, woolly smell’? Then I had this gorgeous time on the Riviera with husband/kids – trips to the Hinterland every day just to ‘eat!eat!eat!’ – tried once, tried twice – super local fare – and I was in love. Absolutely NO probs now
Why, in your magnificent situation, don’t you try again? OMG – would give a lot to be in your shoes!!
Love that gooey cheese shot dripping into nice little rings on your plate.
I’m with Karen and my absolute favorite is D’affinois … I’m salivating just thinking of it! :-p
They also make a triple cream which is wicked!
I could eat my weight in cheese!
The universe is telling me something here… after drooling over the new Top Chef Masters episode today filled with amazing cheeses, I now read this and get drooly all over again. I need to get me to my local cheesery! Er, Fromagerie!
Hi Karen-Oh that’s a lovely one I agree! Great choice!
Hi Pudding Pie Lane-I know, those were the times I guess!
Hi Lisa-Ahhh I know so many people who have cheese as their weakness!
Hi Gourmet Chick-Oh you are very fortunate! Absolutely, there are so many must visit places!
Hi Juliana-Thanks Juliana, have a great week too!
Hi Cakelaw-It was!
I know, I was so fascinated by that. I would have loved to have seen what it looked like! 
Mmm camembert!
Hi Tina-that was a definite highlight!
Hi mashi-What a lovely way to have it indeed!
Hi Maris-hehe thanks Maris!
We have so much fun together 
Hi leah-Ahh of course! Haha I can imagine-that would definitely be something to look forward to!
Hi EHA-THanks Eha! I thought that it was really interesting information! Oh you’re making me hungry!
Hi Nic-Yes it wasn’t too bad at all and at least it was warmish!
Hi Chanel-Absolutely cheese heaven! Ooh yes blue goes so well with quince paste I agree!
Hi Ellie-Haha you are too funny
Thanks, he’s so wonderful I agree!
Hi The Food Mentalist-We did!
Yes I suppose it depends on what they have at the time. You should! 
Hi Holly-Oh yes that’s lovely I agree, a lovely blue. She might grow into it! Thankyou
Hi Lucy-haha good choice! I was drooling when I picked it up!
Hi muppy-Oh no you poor thing! Perhaps you could book into one of these classes? They’re really interesting! Or you could become Australia’s first affineur!
Hi Faith-Wouldn’t it be fun!
I was so happy about that 
Hi Stefania-Oh yes I have tried that one too-it’s lovely!
Mmm sounds like a delicious idea Stefania! 
Hi kim-Absolutely, life is better with chocolate no?
xxx
Hi Chris-Isn’t it lovely! And good to hear that you enjoyed the meal too
Hi Midge-I know, there was so much! I love runny camemberts and bries
Very true about blues in salads or with fruit 
Hi Jen-I haven’t tried cambozola yet!
Hehe I’m craving cheese now too 
hi Michelle-haha isn’t it just!
Hi angie-Ahh yes start off on mild and you can work your way up!
Hi Hannah-Haha absolutely!
I know, that chocolate was diviine 
Haha good timing huh!
Hi Camilla-yes me too I do love camemberts and bries, they’re so divine.
Hi Loll-Haha that’s so cute!
Ahh yes blue bries of course!
Hi Debra-Ahh how lovely to be in pecorino land!
Oh really? I bet Holy Goat might be able to change your mind? 
Hi Susan-It was lots of fun!
Perhaps you could hint around your birthday for a voucher? 
Hi EHA-Yes it’s quite confronting the first time I agree! And I don’t really like goat’s milk as it’s quite strong too. I prefer the milder goat’s cheeses
Hi chopinandmysaucepan-Thankyou! We couldn’t stop it running, it was brilliant!
Hi Lydia-It’s fabulous I agree. Oh now I need some cheese
triple cream mmmm…
Hi Blond Duck-Haha and in ribs too right?
Hi Conor-Oh I definitely believe in listening to the universe!
Beetroot cured salmon?? Have never heard of such a thing. Sounds wonderful! These wine and cheese tasting sounds like a blast
xo
Shame the weather wasn’t doing it’s job! haha
it never occurred to me that cows weren’t Australian!
You’re so lucky, I need a cheesy day like that
Oh and favourite cheese is either the classic cheddar in a cube or Swiss cheese!!
Mmmm these cheeses look very good. I like how runny the Camembert is.
That tasting plate was my idea of heaven. You lucky things! I love mersey valley cheddar but I do enjoy a good Brie as well.
I dreamt about cheese last night. I blame you Lorraine! LOL. My fave cheese is any Swiss Cheese.I have many happy memories of eating raclette and fondues whilst travelling through Europe also, but it seems so much trouble to do it here.
That drippy camembert looks sensational! I’d love to try the beetroot cured salmon too
Love cheese in any shape or form and could just keep eating it. Though I can’t whittle it down to any particular favourite, I did try a new cheese to me last weekend which I purchased at the Deli , Fisherman’s Market in Sydney. It’s an Italian soft cheese called Tre Latti which translates to three milks ie Cow, Sheep and Goat. It was Divine!!
I think that a lot of people make the mistake of eating cheese straight out of the fridge. Please do the cheese justice and bring to room temperature for an hour.
What a divine selection of cheeses! You must have been in heaven!
The weather looked pants Lorraine but the range if cheeses more than compensates. Just need a nice port to round off. Kraft singles SOS
What a nice way to spend a weekend together!
I love goat cheese camenbert, nice and oozy and soft, yumm…
Love the ooze shot. Isn’t Fort Denison a fantastic location to hold events.
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