Swiss seasonal soft cheese bound in spruce bark, pourable when ripe.
Seasonal Swiss soft-ripened cow's milk cheese from Vaud, bound in spruce bark. Spoon it warm from the box. Ships to 48 states.
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Vacherin Mont d'Or is a seasonal soft-ripened cow's milk cheese from the Vaud region of the Swiss Jura, made only in the cold months when the herds come down from the alpine pastures. Every wheel is bound in a collar of local spruce bark, and that collar is doing real work: it holds the delicate paste together as it ripens and it perfumes the cheese with a soft, resinous forest note that shows up in every spoonful.
Inside the box, the paste ripens toward pourable. When it is ready you cut a lid off the top of the rind and go in with a spoon. The interior is warm-cream and cultured butter with a savory pull from the washed skin and that unmistakable pine-forest sweetness from the bark. The rind is wrinkled orange-pink, edible, and part of the picture — brothy and mushroomy against the rich paste.
Hold it at cool room temperature until the top gives under a light press. Then scoop it, spread it on warm bread, or slide the whole box into the oven with a splash of white wine and a garlic clove and eat it straight out of the wood.
Spoonable when ripe, with a wrinkled bloomy-washed rind holding in a paste that pours off the spoon at room temperature. Scoop the top off and eat it straight out of the box.
Gentle and forward-facing rather than stinky. Sweet cream and butter up front, resinous spruce through the middle, a light savory pull on the back end from the washed rind.
Long, resinous finish. The spruce and warm-cream notes linger for 20 to 30 seconds, and the paste keeps coating the palate after the flavor has faded.
Extremely milky, warm-cream and cultured-butter forward. This is one of the most cream-forward cheeses in the case when it hits full ripeness.
A touch of browned-cream and toasted crust from the ripening rind, but nuttiness sits well behind the cream and the wood.
Real forest-floor character from the spruce collar, plus a soft mushroomy note from the bloomy-washed rind. Piney and woodsy rather than barnyardy.
No heat. The washed rind stays gentle and never crosses into peppery or piquant territory.
Washed rind
The rind is a wrinkled orange-to-pink washed skin, edible and part of the fun. It carries a mushroomy, brothy note that plays against the sweet cream inside. The strip of spruce bark ringing the cheese should not be eaten but perfumes everything it touches.
Vacherin Mont d'Or stands on its own, but the right partners turn a wedge into a moment. Regional pairings first — they were built for each other.
Cream this rich wants either bubbles to cut it or a mineral alpine white to echo the mountain terroir. A dry Jura Chardonnay or a young Riesling reads especially well against the spruce.
The paste is so rich that it needs bright fruit or a sharp pickled counterweight. Honey or fig jam extends the sweet cream; cornichons and mustard cut it for a savory course.
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Carefully packaged and shipped from our Beverly Hills shop.
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