Weekend Cheesing: Evora, Chalosse & Teleme

Saturday was a little bit of a lazy day. We had originally wanted to try out a recipe for Pork Chops in Blackberry Zinfandel Sauce -- to go along with one of our fabulous zins from Paso -- but realized that neither of us were willing to cook a pork chop without brining it for a day. It's against our religion at this point.

So although we made a trip to the Farmers Market at the Ferry Plaza and bought all kinds of fun stuff, we had a pretty simple meal of cheese, meat and pate on Saturday night. Didn't bother me. That's one of my favorite sorts of meals, because I'm a born grazer.

So is our Cheese Kitty, who is eyeing some of our pate and the last of the Molinari coppa we bought for picnicking.

At Cowgirl, we picked up an interesting and quite tangy little Portuguese cheese called Evora, and also some irresistible soft-ripened Tomme de Chalosse, affined by Jean d'Alos.










As a treat, Eric also bought me some Teleme, the Peluso family soft cheese that is just fabulous on a toasted bit of baguette. Here's what Janet Fletcher had to say about it in the SF Chronicle.

Teleme is defintely better when nicely goopy, and at a warm room temperature.

Oh, and the pork chops? Worked out well, but they were QUITE spicy. (A rub on the outside had about a teaspoon of cayenne in it, which aerosolized nicely when the chop hit the pan. *cough, cough, cough*)

I think they looked quite nice, but I wasn't thoroughly happy with the balance of the sauce, so I won't post a recipe until we've made some adjustments.

We had it though with the Turley 2004 Dusi Vineyard Zin which was just lovely -- blackberry and spice. Mmmmm...