Book Recommendation: Cheesemonger by Gordon Edgar

One of the reasons traveling by plane is so great is that you get to catch up on all the reading you’ve been meaning to do. For me, that usually means books about restaurants, food, and wine. On my recent trip to Louisiana to visit family, I brought along a book that I discovered on Jeanne Carpenter's Cheese Underground. The book is called Cheesemonger: A Life on the Wedge by Gordon Edgar, which chronicles the life of Edgar as it pertains to his personal experiences with cheese and cheese-makers.

I admire Edgar because he started with basically no cheese knowledge, fudging his way through his initial interview. He was a punk rocker in his youth going from job to job when the opportunity arose at Rainbow where he eventually rose to the position of buyer. He managed to get out a few buzz words that made the folks hiring him think that he knew a little something about cheese like “rennet” and “raw.” The rest is history.

The Botany of Desire, Michael Pollan

Almost ten years ago, a really interesting book by Michael Pollan was published called The Botany of Desire.  The main premise of the work is taken from view of the plant and how humans have directly been affected by their evolution.  It's a fascinating take on how apples, potatoes, tulips, and marijuana have evolved over the past decades and centuries in some cases.  Dan and I watched the documentary film made by PBS based on the book a few nights ago and I was particularly taken with it.  It got the gears cranking in my head, and now a simple trip to the grocery has become an anthropological riddle.

Mastering Cheese by Max McCalman

A cursory read through Max McCalman's new book Mastering Cheese makes me say WOW! I'm so glad that someone has finally taken the time to write an updated reference to take over where Steve Jenkins's Cheese Primer left off.  This book tells you just about everything you need to know about cheese and more for the cheese dork, like me.  It will take me years to digest all of the information contained in this wonderful tome.