Tuesday, October 6, 2009

IMAGINE ARTS FESTIVAL - WATERFORD


Visit Waterford during the Imagine Arts Festival running from 22 to 31 October. These few days are jam packed with cultural events including art exhibtions, films, comedy, music and theatrical shows. To find out more, visit http://www.imagineartsfestival.com/

1 comment:

sutros said...

WINE AND CHEESE

“The forthright and at the same time subtle flavour of cheese stimulates the taste buds and readies them for wine. Wine in turn permits cheese to attain unimaginable heights of flavour. These two fruits of the earth were made for one another.” Pierre Androuet.

A great wine deserves to be accompanied by a well matured cheese; a badly made wine needs it.

Several years ago I had the good fortune to become a resident of France, a country that is an undisputed champion of cheese. I knew nothing about French cheese except for the fact there seem to be more cheeses that one could count and all delicious. It was about this time the internet began creeping into our lives. The mouse on the cheese seemed the perfect idea. My French partner and I created www.fromages.com. We were determined to share France’s Aladdin’s cave of cheeses with the world. Today with a click of the mouse our cheeses are delivered to your door step in twenty four hours, slightly longer for the Far East.

On my journey into this fascinating world I picked up a few cheese books all beautifully presented with glorious coloured photographs and technical descriptions of the particular cheese under review. In fairness many endeavoured to inform the reader of the cheeses taste, place of birth and occasionally a little anecdote, but none to my mind gave the reader the romantic and bucolic nature of these gourmet delights. It was G K Chesterton that guided me to finding a different approach: “The poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.”

I am still very much a novice on the subject of French cheeses but clearly their place in French history deserves an attempt at describing them in poetic terms. With great humility I picked up Chesterton’s glove and selected 30 of the best loved, crafted two odes to cheese and three allegorical stories. I completed a book entitled Tasting to Eternity with a few recipes, wine pairings and technical information about the cheeses. It was a stimulating task and most satisfying. People tell me the book has a definite mouth watering quality and one gets a real sense of the cheeses’ taste.


David Nutt
www.tastingtoeternity.com