Cheesy Christmas 5: Olivet au Foin

Today’s the day that Christmas came to our house.

As is often the case on Sundays, we dinner was the big meal of the day, after church, and Liz’s beef bourgignon was a treat that made onset of the Sunday afternoon nap come even more quickly.

When we awoke, it was time to set the tree up…

Company for the Christmas Tree

Sophie had a friend over – Chloe is becoming a little bit like an honorary Long, as proved by the relentless teasing she endures at Timo’s hand from the moment she arrives.

Since there were 4 of them swarming the tree, Liz went about setting up other decorations & cards & such, while I headed into the kitchen to make some eggnog. It was a near daily part of our Christmas season back in Canada, but you can’t buy it in stores here and it’s too much work to make all the time, so it’s become a real treat.

This was the first time I’d made it where you beat the egg whites separately, then fold them in. Like cappuccino foam, the egg whites invariably made their way to the top, making it as much dessert as drink.

Here’s the recipe if you’d like to try.
(I did the non-cooked version.)

Now… on to cheese!

Day #5: Olivet au Foin

Name: Olivet au Foin
Today’s cheese is named after a the Olivet River that flows through the Indre department, and is actually not all that far from us. “Foin” is the french word for “hay” and it’s included in the name because at one point, producers stored the cheese rounds packed in & separated by hay, to keep the rounds from touching & sticking to each other. The hay eventually lent it’s own unique flavour to the cheese.

They also have the particularity of being produced only during the months of May & June each year, when cows are feeding on the initial flush of Spring grasses growing along the banks of the Olivet and the Loiret which tend to be particularly rich.
Region: The Indre department is only within a short drive from us here in Châtellerault.
Milk: Pasteurized Cow’s milk
Our Score: 3.6/5
All in all this wasn’t a bad cheese, so the low-ish grade might be simply because there was nothing particularly ‘horrible’ about it (like Friday’s Bleu des Causses, or even worse… last year’s Picodon), nor was there anything particularly ‘WOW’ about it. It just ‘was’. That being said, it’s kind of the nature of this cheese… typically placed somewhere between a Coulommiers and a Brie de Meaux depending on how long it’s aged.

Specific comments included “well… the bread was good!” (I’ll give you 3 guesses as to who said that.) 🙂