Cambozola: The heroin of cheeses

It was one of those days. We had some friends coming over and we wanted to have some food available because we always like to eat. I ran out to Andronico’s which is like the food porn of supermarkets to get some cheese and there sitting in front of me was a huge collection of wedges of cambozola cheese. It had been awhile since I had it and I remembered how much I liked it so I grabbed a wedge and went on my way to get some prosciutto di parma and get back home.

Well when our friends came over they decided that they wanted to go out to eat. I’m thinking we’ve got cambozola AND prosciutto di parma in the house [along with a lot of other foods, but still] why go out? Well it turns out we did venture out to the Tennessee Grill and had huge meals that left us feeling like a light dinner sounded best.

As I sat down at the table that night my wife cobbled together some of the food we were going to eat for lunch. She handed me a some toasted bread and I automatically grabbed the cambozola and spread it on to the nice warm toast and noticed it start to slowly melt into the bread as I took a bit.

Oh God. I forgot just how good this tasted, but like the title says, it’s the “heroin of cheeses”. You just can’t stop and you keep going back for more and more. I was cutting up little pieces and dropping them on my salads, crackers, bread. I think I brushed my teeth with it one morning. It is just that good a cheese. I had become obsessed so I went to look up some information on my renewed addiction via Wikipedia:

It was patented and industrially produced for the world market by large German company Champignon in the 1970s. The cheese was invented circa 1900 and is still produced by Champignon. In English-speaking countries, cambozola is often marketed as blue brie.

It is made from the same blue Penicillium roqueforti mold used to make Gorgonzola, Roquefort, and StiltonCream is added to the milk, giving Cambozola a rich consistency. Therind of the cheese is similar to the Camembert rind. Cambozola is considerably milder than Gorgonzola. It features a smooth, creamy texture with a subdued blue flavor.

The cheese’s name appears to be a portmanteau of Camembert and Gorgonzola, given that its flavor profile combines the moist, rich creaminess of Camembert with the sharpness of blue Gorgonzola. It also refers to the Roman name Cambodunum of the city Kempten, where Champignon is located.

OK, I knew it wasn’t make in the Bay Area, but this German cheese with an Italian sounding name made by a company with a French name deserves at least some shrine in whatever town Champignon is in. I started searching for more info on my new love and found that people are putting this on everything now. Hamburgers with cambozola, pizza with cambozola, cambozola cheese pastries. It’s everywhere. It’s got a somewhat strong, but smooth taste, but none of that stinky cheese smell. It’s also a semi-soft cheese so spreading it isn’t too difficult. I just finished a snack of cambozola on toast with some barnier olives from Andronico’s and the tastes went well together. It didn’t even clash with the dark chocolate I had to finish my meal. Then I found out that Michael Chiarello of NapaStyle and Food Network fame has made a sauce with cambozola that he sells through NapaStyle and he even gives a recipe for asparagus with cambozola sauce on the Food Network website. OK, I know what I’m making for dinner tonight.

There is a downside to this wonderful cheese though…it’s not cheap. A pound will run you between $15-$20 depending where you get it. We used to find the cheapest at costco, but we don’t go there as often as we rarely need a palette full of anything anymore. If you can keep the addiction in check though it is a great cheese to try. It’s pretty easy to find in San Francisco as most grocery stores have it and it seems to be made only by Champignon so you don’t have to wonder whether you’re getting the best brand or not.




Hi I’m Eric and I’m a Mac Addict

Yes, I admit it. I have an addiction to my iMac. I’m not going to go all Mac is better than PC thing because it would probably be the same if I had a PC and it was suddenly gone. I noticed something was wrong with the computer when it started to get really slow and programs started to hang. I took it into the Apple store and they said they could see the drive, but I should back it up and bring it in for a replacement of the hard drive.

YIKES! I hadn’t been able to do a time machine back up since April 11th and realized that I might end up loosing some stuff so I took it home, loaded snow leopard on to an external I happened to have lying around [this is why you have externals lying around]. After three days I managed to get all the files off the computer and realized, “Hey, if it’s cleaned off maybe I can just erase and reinstall from the back up!”

Well, it started off fine, but eventually it showed me that the entire hard drive was screwed and I’d need to bring it in. Now this isn’t so bad because at least my wife has a MacBook with an account on it for me [this is why you have more than one mac], but she might want to use the computer at the same time I’m using the computer. So hear in is the beginning of my week without my own computer. The iMac is like my buddy. It does everything for me. It’s my recording studio, it’s a phone, TV, radio,,,Geez our lives can revolve around our computers and you don’t realize it until they’re gone. My wife didn’t realize what the 21st century was like until I got her the MacBook that I have know stolen from her possession to post this article.

I have an iMac at work, but it’s not mine and while it acts like my buddy [due to the syncing of my information between computers] it’s also a lot of other people’s buddies because there are like 10 accounts on it. This is the closest to my buddy that I’ll have. It’s kind of like having a threesome with your wife, only a computer is involved and not some blond cheerleader with that waka waka funk music playing in the background.

Apple tells me it will be a week to replace the drive because they’re all backed up at the store. This is something I’ve always noticed about Apple Stores. If you go to a mall, look at how many people are in the other stores, then look at how many people are in the Apple Store. The Apple Stores are always packed. It’s like the hottest club in town without a happy hour. So now with my luck I’ll be a week without the iMac and Apple will suddenly process my order for my new iPhone 4 and get it to me before the iMac is back in action [yeeee=ah beeaches!]

P.S. to Apple: I heard your conference on Friday and know the problem is fixed with the iPhone 4 so can you speed up the 3 week wait a bit?