Brie De Meaux

The soft mould rind cheese is made with raw cow’s milk and takes its name from the area of Meaux some 50km from Paris. Brie has become a word, much like Camembert and Cheddar, to describe a style of cheese that can vary hugely in quality. There are some very good fermier (made by the farmer) bries made in France with raw milk. These tend to have a different, more pungent flavour. Great Brie de Meaux is full of flavour and aroma but is very balanced and restrained. It is made in a large, cylindrical disk approximately 35–40 cm across and 5 cm high. This gives the cheese a high surface area, which it needs if the bloom on the exterior is to break down the interior curd. It is this process that transforms the texture of the paste from chalky to supple. The candidum rind gives off a typical raw mushroom aroma and, when ripe, there is a slight sharpness. The flavour is steamed salty vegetables and cream.
Most bloomy-rind cheeses are shaped as flat disks allowing the rind work its way to the middle more quickly. If the cheeses were any thicker, it would take too long for this to happen, by which time the cheese closest to the rind would have matured past its best and be quite unpleasant.