Aged Gouda Cheese
Buying Aged Gouda Cheese
Every once in a while you meet someone who really, really knows their stuff about a particular food topic and a couple of weeks ago I meet this guy Jack at our local farmers market in the cheese area and we get to talking. Jack is a colorful guy who tells it like it is and doesn’t care if you like what he has to say or not. As soon as we started talking, I knew I could learn a boatload from him.
I sampled a taste of aged Gouda cheese at a charity event to benefit Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation, an incredible group of people whose goal is to raise money to find a cure for childhood cancer “one cup at time.” Many of you may have heard of Alex’s foundation but if not, I highly recommend you visit their site and read more about them and make a contribution. It is a wonderful cause and I will write about the event in a future blog.
Back to Aged Gouda Cheese
Most of us have enjoyed some form of Gouda cheese in our lives. It is a yellow cheese made from cow’s milk and is often found with the red or yellow paraffin wax coating in the supermarket. It gets its name from the city of Gouda in the Netherlands where it originated.
Gouda as a young cheese is easy to slice and may be great to serve to the kids in their lunch packs but just doesn’t have that much flavor. It’s great if you enjoy a mild, mellow flavored cheese but if you want a much more distinct flavor, you’ll want to try aged Gouda.
Aged Gouda has a wonderful distinctive flavor that can be both sharp and sweet - think of butterscotch. It is a hard cheese that doesn’t come in the red wax covering, but a natural buff colored rind. The cheese itself has an amber color that Jack explained to me comes from a coloring agent called annatto that gives it the pale orange color.
I read in one of my favorite cheese books, Cheese Primer, that some cheeses “once had a natural orange hue caused by the vitamin D that cows ingested from grazing on green plants. But winter milk comes from cows that are fed silage, and the cheeses that result from this milk are white.”
So the cheese makers started adding food coloring like annatto to the milk so they would look the same year round. Jack explained to me “all cheese are naturally cream colored and many use coloring for eye appeal.”
Aged Gouda
When I asked Jack about aged Gouda, he pulled out several selections for me to try. Each sample was older than the next. There was 4-year-old cheese that he called Hollander, a 6 – 8 year old Gouda and a 4 – 5 year old “farmer’s cheese” also called Boerenkaas made from whole, raw cows milk. They were all delicious but I chose the Hollander to buy.
All of these cheeses had a distinctive sweet and salty taste with a hint of butterscotch at the finish. Their colors were all deep amber to burnt orange and the textures were very similar to Parmigiano-Reggiano. In fact, Jack told me many of his customers use these aged Goudas as a substitute for Parmesan cheese for grating.
What to Drink with Aged Gouda
We all know the Dutch love their beer and make some of the best beers in the world. Jack said these aged Goudas are perfect to serve with strong Dutch beer as well as fruity red wines and tea.
Post Your Comments About Aged Gouda Cheese
I highly recommend you give this cheese a try if you can find it in your local cheese shop and then tell us about your experience with it in the comments section below. Now that I have met Jack, I hope to get back to tasting more cheese and writing about them here and on my cheese page on the main web site.
And don’t forget about my cooking community forum that you where there is a Cheese section for you to post your own favorite cheeses for the rest of us to learn about and try.
on September 23rd, 2010 at 12:07 pm
I admit, I am a huge fan of aged gouda! I had hoped to see more wine-food pairing suggestions in this article but I suppose it is not incredibly difficult for me to pair off of that delight butterscotch note you mention. For a light fall picnic I am thinking dense grain bread, aged Gouda, and apples or pears would do well, maybe even hard pear or apple cider! Does anyone have any ideas for wine? I am personally drawn to sweet wines being a Michigan native, but maybe it would be overkill with the sweetness of the cheese? Just thinking aloud, please tell your friends and family to try aged Gouda you won’t be disappointed!
Great idea for a follow up post. I’ll work on it and thank you for your suggestions. They sound just right. - RG
on December 26th, 2010 at 11:40 am
How do you get the rind off aged Gouda?
Hi Dolores, not sure what you are asking. I purchase Gouda in wedges and just cut the cheese off the wedge and toss the rind when it’s all gone. - RG
on July 17th, 2011 at 11:20 am
AGED GOUDA IS A TRUE PLEASURE. THE NUTTY FLAVOR IS OUTSTANDING. I LIVE IN FLORIDA AND ALL OF A SUDDEN I CANNOT FIND IT. DO YOU KNOW WHERE IN THE SARASOTA AREA IT IS SOLD?
Hi Michael, I would check with your local cheese shops and if they don’t have it, ask them to get some for you. I’m surprised it isn’t more available. I’m starting to even see it in some supermarkets. - RG
on October 10th, 2011 at 5:57 pm
Is it OK to store aged Gouda un refrigerated?
Great question Pam. Me, I personally wrap all my cheeses back in the wax paper I purchase them in if I’m going to eat them in the next day or two and store in the refrigerator. If I know I won’t be eating them for a couple of days, I wrap them in plastic first and if I know I won’t get to them for a while, I vacuum seal them. This is not how many cheese experts tell you how to handle your cheese, but it works for me. Now saying that, I asked my current cheese person, Bill from DiBruno’s, and here is what he had to say:
“Google “refrigeration” and see how long its been around. Cheeses have been around for thousands of years. Really excellent Goudas and provolones never need refrigeration. As aged Gouda mature, they lose moisture and the fats become “crystalides” which are salt granules that people think are mold. In answer to your other questions: if the person at the counter is trying to impress you with the age of the Gouda they’re fooling you. Make sure you taste. The cheese speaks for itself.”
Thanks Bill. I’m hoping Bill starts contributing some more about his experience in the cheese world. - RG
on November 5th, 2011 at 12:27 pm
I love this cheese and just bought a good wedge. I also found that it goes well with any beer! I served it with crakers and a good mango chutney.
I find that it also subs well for parm and carries away a twice baked potato.
on December 31st, 2011 at 11:14 pm
It’s addictive. Absolutely the best tasting cheese I have ever had. I’m going to try substituting it for parm on my pasta after reading the posts. Thanks.