Illustration by Josh Kramer.
By DCist Contributor Josh Kramer
Who needs a cellphone camera when you have a pen and paper? Drawn to Flavor highlights local dishes and drinks in vivid watercolor. In these posts, Illustrator and journalist Josh Kramer tries to honor all the energy and creativity that goes into making food beautiful and delicious.
Cheese holds a special place in my cholesterol-clogged heart. I worked as a “monger” in three different shops including the closed—but not forgotten—Cowgirl Creamery in Penn Quarter. Without being too hokey, it was an honor to steward products made with such care, knowledge, and commitment. Cheese was the beginning of my interest in good food, and it was inevitable that I would pay tribute to it in this column.
It was also a treat to educate customers over the course of years and to be part of a small community of food professionals that care passionately about artisan cheese. Most of my coworkers from those days transitioned into cheese-adjacent jobs. This includes Right Proper “Cheese Wiz” Tim Lake. On most nights at the brewpub in Shaw (624 T Street NW), you can find Lake slinging slices and pouring pairings behind his cheese bar.
Pick from the menu, or better yet, have a conversation, and Lake will help you find what you might like or what’s interesting. For this tasting I wanted complementary, assertive flavors from some of my favorite cheesemakers. Coincidentally, they were all cow’s milk. The Hamden (bottom left) from Vulto is semi-soft, tomme-style cheese. It has a barnyard-y meatiness but it’s not overwhelming. The Pleasant Ridge Reserve from Uplands (middle) is hard cheese in a nutty alpine style that’s full of bright citrus notes. Finally, the Bayley Hazen Blue is soft but not spreadable and deliciously bacon-y.
We’ve come a long way since Cowgirl closed, but thankfully there are more options for buying and eating cheese in the District than ever before. What you really get from a cheese bar like this is knowledge and expertise.
If you’re serving cheese for the holidays, here’s a reminder: Serve at room temperature, wrap up in anything but plastic-wrap, and have one knife for each cheese. Enjoy!
