Food Review: Bleu de Bresse

Today I went to my favourite local cheese shop, Les Amis du Fromage. Twenty minutes of harrowing decision-making later, I walked out with three never-before-tried cheeses, all from France: a double cream brie (I never turn down the opportuniy to have brie), a firm/semi-firm Tomme de Montagne, which I will taste tomorrow, and a soft creamy blue cheese, Bleu de Bresse, which is of course the subject of my review.

It should be known that I love blue cheese. I know, it has mold, blah blah whatever-cakes, but it is delicious. The blue cheese my mum and I (the only two blue cheese enthusiasts in the house) usually have is a firm, crumbly and very strong specimen. It has some serious bite to it, and you only need the tiniest bit of it, unless you're looking for a flavour overload. Which I sometimes am, to be fair.

Bleu de Bresse, in contrast, is soft, creamy and smooth (other than the blue bits, I mean). As opposed to my "standard" blue, which collapsed into crumbles when you cut it, BdB is more spreadable than cream cheese. This is an advantage, since I'm far less ervous about eating a coveted cheese if I'm not terrified that that the cheese-gold could fall off my cracker and be wasted. The taste itself is quite nice, but a lot milder than my standard (which I have decided to call Crumbleu). It has the same blue taste, but it's a lot more subtle than the Crumbleu. If cheeses were, say, cocktail bar patrons trying to pick you up, Crumbleu is standing on the table, all "Hey, look at me! I am HOT. Wanna go home with me?", while Bleu de Bresse is more subtle, making eye contact and smiling at you from the opposite end of the restaurant before actually approaching.

Of course, I don't put cheeses and (in my case) guys throught he same selection system. The Bleu de Bresse is dreamy, but my Crumbleu isn't getting the boot by any means. It's just lucky it's a cheese, and not a guy at a bar.