"The undisputed king of cheeses"

I was in Big John's Market today, picking up a few things. Being in the wine country, the market has a separate cheese department, and as I walked by, I caught a delicious whiff of cheese. I peeked over a low partition, and saw a youngish worker using a cheese knife (like the pointed one in the picture) to carefully split a whole wheel of Parmesano-Reggiano. He was being intently supervised by his manager.

I watched for a moment, enjoying the way the light showed off the beautiful crystallization of the cheese, and the manager caught my eye. I nodded at the cheese, and said, "It's a real thing of beauty." He laughed, and replied, "It certainly is." Then he took his own knife, split out a small chunk from the center of the cheese, and passed it to me to taste. "Nothing like the heart," he said.

I popped the cheese in my mouth. Nutty, creamy, salty, rich, completely decadent. I think I actually moaned a little. "That is so good! Thanks."

Mmmmmmm. Cheese.

The quote in the title is from Mario Batali, by the way.

Choco-fun

When Sean was a kid, he was a big big fan of Legos. He built tons of cool things. Too bad he never got around to making Chocolate Lego bricks. Yum. Also, at the same blog, for you Doctor Who fans, exterminate your chocolate cravings with the Chocolate Dalek.

And if you have that chocolate craving, but don't know where to get your fix, try Chocomap, a Google map mash-up with more than 1200 worldwide chocolate shops.

(Via Paul Music.)