My never-ending quest continues in this post, to find a cheese that's not at least okay. Will today be the momentous day? The candidate in question is a cinco lanzas cheese, from Lacteas Garcia Baquero S.A. Which, as the title states, is a Spanish company.
I was a bit surprised to learn that this company is only moderately old, having started in 1962. Hersilio Garcia Baquero used to sell fresh milk to his neighbors. But, at this time he decided to try his hand at cheese making, and cheese mongering. Initially he made seven cheeses a day, and eventually his company makes, well, I don't know exactly how many a day, but it's clearly much much more than the previous figure. Baquero decided to make his cheeses from goat, cow, and sheep's milk. The company website breaks down each animal's milk as having the following attributes. Goat's milk, "adds some acidity and spice." Cow's milk "provides creaminess and lactic nuance." And sheep's milk allegedly provides, "greater flavor and density," and also improves a cheese's odor. The technological advances of the 1970's helped to build the company's brands, and by the 1990's it opened up several other manufacturing centers. Currently Lacteas Garcia Baquero S.A. is exported to over 60 countries around the globe. It's also won a slew of awards at various cheese competitions. (Which are listed on the website--it's oddly impresssive to me just how many different cheese competitions there are. Given my obsession with this food type, I should investigate and see if any occur in my neck of the woods.) Alternate flavors offered by this company include kinds that are cured, semi-cured, various specialty reserves, the Spanish favorite Manchego (see my post on August 29, 2015 for more information), and several cabras (which are goat versions of Manchego).
Lacteas Garcia Baquero cinco lanzas limited edition cheese: Not much of an odor. Yellow color, with a brown inedible rind. Semi-hard texture. I had some plain at first. That way it was very good. Mild, but pleasantly salty. Next I had some on rolls, melted in a microwave, and then topped with ketchup. Or, a quick and dirty grilled cheese sandwich, I guess. This was also very tasty, perhaps even a bit better. As cheeses go this was fairly mediocre, but that means it's still better than most other foods. Also, according to the label, this was actually made from a mix of cow, sheep, and goat milks. Really the only downside was that it was rather pricey. My .285 pound serving (or 129 grams) was $8.55, which works out to $30.00 per pound (which is .45 kilos).
So, to the shock of probably no one, I STILL haven't found a cheese that's bad. I can assure everyone that I will keep trying nonetheless. Because of my ethics, and because that means I get to eat lots of good to delicious foods while maintaining a fictitious higher moral stance. Finally, I was kind of inspired by some of the descriptions on the company website. I think I'd like it noted on my headstone that I "had an impressive degree of lactic nuance."
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