Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night

On March 21st, Alma Chocolates hosted Alberta St.’s The Cheese Plate Food Cart in the Alma Kitchen to create a dinner of inventive grilled cheese bites. The Alma Kitchen is separate from their shop on NE 28th- instead this is a special event room in the newly renovated 105 year old American Brush Building, a former candy factory and grocery distribution center and then American Brush company (and thus the name- the sign for this still is painted on in white letters on the red bricks on one side of the building as you approach from Burnside) and which is supposedly haunted. Thankfully, although the building is rather quiet, when I pulled open one of the two bathroom doors at the end of the hall (not marked- you just have to look for the sliding lock that switches from In Use to Vacant) that said Vacant and saw just a bunch of janitorial and construction tools, I quickly closed it but nothing was moving and I noticed no shadows.

The event was set up as a casual cocktail party with rustic charm using burlap sacks to cover tables and the glow of lots of white candles: it would not have surprised me to hear there were 100 candles throughout the room.

There were a few wooden chairs set up at small tables along the walls around the rectangular space. This was a bit of a surprise to me as most cocktail events I know use lots of tall cocktail tables so that people may not be sitting, but they can anchor themselves by putting food and drink there, and those are throughout the space, including the middle. I got there close to when the doors opened at 6 and my friends and I snagged chairs by a good sized table, but more chairs must have been brought in as additional people sat in a row behind us. Most people ended up being able to sit as the staff brought out the wooden cutting boards to pass out bites of the grilled cheeses, although a few were left leaning against a wall. In the corner, musicians with a guitar and saxophone provided background music.

Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen

The first half hour included snacking from a table with plates of cheese and Alma chocolate- preview of individual bites of all of the cheeses that were being used in the sandwiches we would soon enjoy: River’s Edge “Up in Smoke” Chèvre, Portland Creamery “Sweet Fire” chèvre, Willamette Valley French Prairie Brie, Briar Rose Creamery Feta, Rogue Creamery “Crater Lake” Blue, La Mariposa Five Corners cheese, and Briar Rose Creamery “Madrona” (tallegio style) cheese.

When you first entered the room and saw this table, you couldn’t help but be really impressed by the selection and quality of artisan goods here. The accompaniment here of popcorn rather than the expected vehicle of crackers or baguettes was surprising (especially given 2 of the 5 cheeses were chèvres and how awesome the PDX Cheese Cart’s homemade crackers which I sampled at Wedge 2012 are) but that didn’t stop anyone from enjoying the cheeses, and kept our appetite ready for the grilled cheese bites.

Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Briar Rose Creamery "Madrona" (tallegio style) cheese Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Portland Creamery "Sweet Fire" chèvre Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Rogue Creamery "Crater Lake" Blue Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen La Mariposa Five Corners cheese Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Briar Rose Creamery Feta Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Willamette Valley French Prairie Brie Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Meyer Lemon Bourbon chocolate truffle Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Coconut Mexican and Habanero Caramel chocolate truffles Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen

The Menu of Oregon Cheese & Alma Chocolate included

  • Briar Rose Creamery “Madrona” with pear chutney, toasted and sandwiched with salted peanut butter cup cookies. A great start and end salty and savory and sweet “grilled cheese” course.
    Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Briar Rose Creamery Madrona salted peanut butter cup cookie sandwich Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Briar Rose Creamery Madrona salted peanut butter cup cookie sandwich
  • Rogue Creamery “Crater Lake Blue” with mocha almond nibby bark, toasted on cranberry bread. Warming up the blue cheese really brought out more of the flavor
    Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Rogue Creamery Crater Lake Blue with mocha almond nibby bark, toasted on cranberry bread Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Rogue Creamery Crater Lake Blue with mocha almond nibby bark, toasted on cranberry bread
  • Willamette Valley “French Prairie Brie,” habanero caramel, toasted on warm moist banana bread, I may have had 3 of these and taken 4 bites home in one of the pink boxes they offered at the end…
    Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Willamette Valley French Prairie Brie, habanero caramel, banana bread
  • La Mariposa “Five Corners” cheese and Briar Rose Creamery Feta, Mexican chocolate mole sauce, toasted on corn bread. Although this was tasty, since I was able to enjoy larger chunks of the feta earlier during the first half hour (which is mild and not as salty as you might assume with feta), I would say I liked it earlier than here because there just wasn’t enough of it and although I could see the Five Corners cheese it got a little lost with the corn bread and mole.
    Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen La Mariposa Five Corners cheese and Briar Rose Creamery Feta, Mexican chocolate mole sauce, corn bread Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen La Mariposa Five Corners cheese and Briar Rose Creamery Feta, Mexican chocolate mole sauce, corn bread
  • Portland Creamery “Sweet Fire Chèvre,” shaved dark chocolate truffle, toasted on buttery soft almond brioche was a spicy sweet soft bite
    Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen Portland Creamery Sweet Fire Chèvre shaved dark chocolate truffle, almond brioche
  • River’s Edge “Up in Smoke” Chèvre, lavender caramel sauce, toasted on pretzel bread. This was my favorite cheese of the night with its strong smoky flavor
    Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen River’s Edge Up in Smoke Chèvre, lavender caramel sauce,pretzel bread

The event was BYOB, although DRY’s sodas were also available in vanilla bean or lavender or you could mix the two! I really liked the vanilla bean soda- and although we also enjoyed a bubbly sparkling wine I had brought along, the soda also was a lovely refreshing pairing. The April F+P birthday party is coming up in April, and I am intrigued with the idea of including a couple cases of DRY soda with a bar for DIY mixers: if you visit the website they offer several cocktail mix recipes.
Alma Dinner Series: Grilled Cheese Night at the Alma Kitchen DRY soda vanilla bean

The next event in the Alma Dinner series is An Evening of Beer + Chocolate featuring five local breweries (Alameda, pFriem, Hopworks, The Commons Brewery, and Double Mountain) and five local chocolatiers (Alma Chocolate, Cacao, Cocanu, Woodblock, and Xocolatl de David) pairing their chocolate and beer together on April 4th, again at the Alma Studio.

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Photos from The Wedge: Portland Celebrates Cheese Festival

The Wedge comes to Portland every other year to celebrate Northwest cheese. The block in front of Green Dragon was blocked off so that you could sip a beer with your tastings as well at this farmer’s market-style event that let you sample at various cheesemaker artisan booths.  Overall, I believe there were 18 cheesemakers present along with a few other booths related to cheese (such as smoked salmon or Olympic Provision meats to go with your cheese plate, or educational via the Oregon State University or Urban Cheesecraft or  Dairy Farmers of Oregon).

The Wedge Portland Celebrates Cheese banner 2011 The Wedge Portland Cheese Fairview Farm Goat Dairy

We came home with eight cheeses, so that naturally illustrates what worked with both our palates and rated high. These included Beehive Cheese Company’s Habanero Apple Walnut Promontory and also their Barely Buzzed which is rolled in espresso and lavender; Willamette Valley Cheese Company tempted us with many cheeses but the cumin gouda made the cut; Fairview Farm Goat Dairy bringing the Icelandic Skyr style in with cranberry and one with strawberry made the biggest impression on me; Rollingstone Chevre (traveling in from Idaho so not quite Northwest but hey welcome) tempted us with a jar of Basil Pepper Provencal and a 3 Pepper Chevre log (as well as other chevres varying from orange + almond and sundried tomato pesto to cranberry walnut or basil pistachio tortas); and Fern’s Edge Dairy with a fig walnut sweet chevre (other tempting chevres included Chantarelle garlic, Pear Anise, Apricot Honey, Blueberry Ginger! And, the signature Mt Zion also was quite a treat).

The Wedge Portland Cheese offerings of Willamette Valley CheeseThe Wedge Portland Cheese Willamette Valley Cheese Herb de Provence HavartiThe Wedge Portland Cheese Willamette Valley Cheese  Brindisi Aged FontinaThe Wedge Portland Cheese Willamette Valley Cheese Aged GoudaThe Wedge Portland Cheese Willamette Valley Cheese Cumin GoudaThe Wedge Portland Cheese Willamette Valley Cheese Cumin GoudaThe Wedge Portland Cheese Willamette Valley Cheese borenkaas gouda Wedge Portland Cheese Rollingstone Chevre Wedge Portland Cheese Rollingstone Chevre Bail Pepper ProvencalWedge Portland Cheese Rollingstone Chevre Wedge Portland Cheese Rollingstone Chevre

Runner ups included La Mariposa’s Cinco Esquinas and Chubut, Golden Glen Creamery dill & garlic packed a flavorful punch, Samish Bay Cheese with their unique and impressive lineup with Ladysmith (a fresh cheese) that included one with arugula and another that had a rind with cocoa + chipotle (on the left in one of the photos), Portland Creamery’s new entrance to the market with a Pumpkin Stout chevre and Sweet Fire chevre, and Black Sheep Creamery Basque Style Cheese and Tin Willow Tomme.

Wedge Portland Cheese La MariposaWedge Portland Cheese La Mariposa Wedge Portland Cheese Samish Bay Ladysmith Wedge Portland Cheese Samish Bay Black Mambazo LadysmithWedge Portland Cheese Samish Bay Ladysmith

Tillamook, one of the main sponsors, brought their little orange car (Loafy) and all these buttons and cheese. I’m a big fan of the vintage white extra sharp cheddar and smoked black pepper and white cheddar. They were handing out stacks of coupons for all their products- cheese, butter, ice cream… Enjoy these cheese photos and those from other wonderful cheesemakers.

Wedge Portland Cheese TillamookWedge Portland Cheese Tillamook Wedge Portland Cheese Briar Rose CreameryWedge Portland Cheese Briar Rose Creamery Chocolate Goat Cheese Truffles Wedge Portland Cheese Wilapa Hills Two Faced Blue cheese Wedge Portland Cheese Golden Glen Creamery Wedge Portland Cheese Mt Townsend Creamery Wedge Portland Cheese Fern's Edge DairyWedge Portland Cheese Fern's Edge DairyWedge Portland Cheese Fern's Edge DairyWedge Portland Cheese Fern's Edge Dairy Wedge Portland Cheese Fern's Edge Dairy

Overall, it was a great way to get introduced to more cheesemakers and their offerings- I liked everyone in a different way, and I’m glad to see cultivate more recognition when I go visit the cheese cases. There are incredible offerings right here in the Northwest that  deserves a Cheese Trail map that would compete head to head Vermont’s Cheese Trail.

 

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