Spruce-wrapped Vermont bloomy, molten and spoonable, with sweet cream and a resinous finish.
Spruce-bark-wrapped bloomy from Jasper Hill Farm in Vermont. Spoonable paste, sweet cream, woodsy finish. Serve with mostarda and crusty bread.
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Harbison is a soft-ripened cow's milk cheese from Jasper Hill Farm in Greensboro Bend, Vermont, wrapped in a strip of spruce cambium harvested from the farm's own woodlands. Named for Anne Harbison, the grandmother of Greensboro, it is a bark-wrapped bloomy that arrives ready to eat with a spoon.
The paste starts to loosen in the underground vaults during a six-to-thirteen-week affinage, and it keeps softening on the way to your kitchen. Cut the top rind off a ripe wheel and the interior is molten, spoonable, and glossy, held in place by the spruce ring around the sides. Younger wheels stay set enough to slice, and the bark can be peeled away in that state. Flavor-wise it leads with sweet cream and button mushroom, then pulls in a woodsy, resinous note from the spruce, a lemony brightness, and a soft mustard-seed warmth on the finish that lingers on the palate.
This is one of the great American bark-wrapped cheeses and a really easy one to serve as a centerpiece: bring the whole wheel to the table, take the top off, and let people scoop straight out of it.
Spoonable and molten under the rind, with a paste that slumps loose when the top is cut open. Younger wheels stay firm enough to slice; a ripe one wants a spoon.
Sweet cream and button mushroom up front, with a woodsy pull from the spruce bark and a soft mustard note through the middle. Balanced rather than loud.
A long, resinous finish that holds the spruce and mushroom on the palate for a good twenty to thirty seconds after the paste is gone.
Fresh sweet cream is the dominant note, buttery and clean, with a light lemony brightness that keeps it from feeling heavy.
A touch of browned butter richness through the middle, but the nut character sits behind the cream and forest notes rather than leading.
Woodsy and vegetal from the spruce cambium wrap, with button mushroom and forest-floor notes that ripen deeper as the paste softens.
A gentle mustard-seed warmth on the finish, more suggestion than heat.
Bloomy rind
The strip of spruce cambium around the wheel is not eaten, but it steeps the paste with resin, wood, and forest-floor character. The bloomy top rind is edible and carries the mushroomy, vegetal finish.
Harbison stands on its own, but the right partners turn a wedge into a moment. Regional pairings first — they were built for each other.
The paste is rich and creamy, so a lightly oaked white or a barrel-aged sour beer cuts through the fat while echoing the woodsy spruce note. Sparkling wine and dry cider work the same way with the acid instead of the oak.
The sweet-cream paste wants a fruit contrast with a little acid, and mostarda's mustard bite lines up with the cheese's own mustard-seed finish. Crusty bread is the vehicle when the wheel goes fully spoonable.
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Packed cold for overnight delivery.
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