Cheese of the month March 2016: Wertacher Goass from Robert Maul/Allgäu, Germany

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Most of you will be familiar with Allgäuer Bergkäse, the hard cheese from the Bavarian part of the Alps. There is good stuff, great stuff, and very ordinary stuff (or, to be more direct: boring). But first: the Allgäu region is absolutely beautiful. Go and visit! Then you’ll also understand how large a part of it isn’t suited to agriculture, because it’s too high or too steep to be turned into fields. Meaning: pastures make a lot of sense around there. That’s why the good folks in the Allgäu produce way more milk than they could ever drink, and as fresh milk is a fickle product to get to market, there is a lot of cheese. Of variable quality, just as in real life…

So, your regular Bergkäse, mountain cheese, is a more or less mature hard cheese from more or less happy cows. But there are alternatives, even in the Allgäu, like this not so hard goat cheese from a small creamery in Wertach with the sweet name „’s Molkefässle“ (the small whey barrel). For this Robert Maul turns untreated, raw goat’s milk into smallish round wheels (regular Bergkäse typically weighs in around 30kg) which he matures for about four months. During that time he washes them not with brine and the characteristic funky red cultures, but with whey. Which has a completely different effect: it makes for a totally different rind, and as what happens on the outside of a cheese profoundly influences what’s going on inside, this makes for a superdelicious balance between sweet, concentrated milk and elegant, reviving acidity. A goat cheese for non-goat cheese lovers. Promised. Oh, some more  Bavarian dialect for you: Goass means goat. Enjoy!

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