It's that time of year: What Stinky Cheese is on the Menu at Your Festivities?

[JCMach1]

In my house, it's all about the Stilton

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. I have some mango-ginger Stilton.

Yum.

[JCMach1]

3. Yum!

[grasswire]

2. I have some Amish gorgonzola

Will probably serve it with crackers and other cheeses and some walnuts and a fruity white wine.

[JCMach1]

4. Sounds too damn good...

Sorry, am a cheesaholic here...

[grasswire]

5. I could spend hundreds of dollars at the cheese counter

But of course I don't. My local grocer has samples out every day and I get to do a lot of tasting that way. My favorite for tasting? A true French roquefort.

[JCMach1]

6. I remember with fondness feeding on fresh chevre... literally from the shepherds

on top of a mountain in Armenia. I was in a tiny trailer having warm tea with the pitter patter of the sleet on the metal. That cheese was amazing.

[JCMach1]

7. Here's an explanation as to why we love it so much:

...Why is cheese so addicting? Certainly not because of its aroma, which is perilously close to old socks. The first hint of a biochemical explanation came in 1981, when scientists at Wellcome Research Laboratories in Research Triangle Park, N.C., found a substance in dairy products that looked remarkably like morphine. After a complex series of tests, they determined that, surprisingly enough, it actually was morphine. By a fluke of nature, the enzymes that produce opiates are not confined to poppies -- they also hide inside cows' livers. So traces of morphine can pass into the animal's bloodstream and end up in milk and milk products. The amounts are far too small to explain cheese's appeal. But nonetheless, the discovery led scientists on their search for opiate compounds in dairy products.

And they found them. Opiates hide inside casein, the main dairy protein. As casein molecules are digested, they break apart to release tiny opiate molecules, called casomorphins. One of these compounds has about one-tenth the opiate strength of morphine. The especially addicting power of cheese may be due to the fact that the process of cheese-making removes water,lactose and whey proteins so that casein is concentrated. Scientists are now trying to tease out whether these opiate molecules work strictly within the digestive tract or whether they pass into the bloodstream and reach the brain directly... http://www.healthdiaries.com/blogs/vegetarianblues/archives/2004/09/casein_and_cheese_more_addictive_than_chocolate.html

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

9. Cheese is not only the food of the gods, it's the opiate of the masses!

Fascinating...

[mr blur]

8. Stinking Bishop -

and it does, but it's wonderful.

http://www.teddingtoncheese.co.uk/acatalog/de339.htm

[hobbit709]

10. Cambozola

[bif]

11. Depends on what they have at Trader Joe's

Heading over there in about an hour. We're going to have a whole evening of appetizers instead of a sit-down diner.