Day Four Hundred and Two : A Belated Irish Favorite

Since I didn't have the chance to discuss an Irish cheese yesterday I thought today I'd tell you all about my favorite Irish cheese -- Cashel Blue. Crafted by the Grubb Family in County Tipperary this was Ireland's original artisanal blue cheese. The Grubb Family actually settled in Ireland three hundred years before when they were exiled from England due to religious differences. From that time, the Grubbs presued mill work along with buttermaking and later cheesemaking and farming. The current Grubb generation developed Cashel Blue in 1984 and the rest is history.

Cashel Blue is a pasteurized semi soft cow's milk blue that is traditionally aged for anywhere between two and four months. It is classically spicy and piquant but with a milky creamy finish -- this my friends is blue cheese done well! Knowing that it was the first Irish blue sets it apart from the pack I think. Isn't nice to know this guy is a trendsetter?

What to drink with it?

If you happen to be lucky enough to score a young piece of Cashel Blue, I recommend having it with a nice light to medium bodied white wine, maybe a Pinot Blanc or something of the sort. Young Cashel Blue will be creamier and less piquant, a rounder mouth feel. Should you get an older piece, it will definitely be more biting, spicy and in your face but never so much that you don't have that fabulous melt in your mouth sort of feel. The older the cheese is, the better it will be with sweet or dessert wine.

A great Irish cheese that is a crowdpleaser. Irish cheese are few and far between here and this one is definitely worth investing in a chunk of.

Image courtesy of http://www.cashelblue.com/