See my previous post, “Delicious Taleggio Failure,” for the basics . . .

The recipe from cheesemaking.com recommends a maximum of eight or so weeks of aging, but mine was slow. After the initial wipings with brine and B. linens, I kept the rind moist. The color developed quite nicely, but I expected that, like a Limburger, eventually the rind would start producing its own moisture. So I kept on going . . .

Finally around week nine it started to develop a “tacky” rind, but I sort of lost track of that “eight week” recommendation. Here it is at week 12:

(top)

(bottom)

As you can see, not only did it start to develop white mold (not a problem, as I found out later), but the rind started to crack:

The rind itself is a lovely salmony-orange color:

Cutting into it, the paste was fairly dense, with only a few small holes (what looks like larger holes is just the result of my poor cutting!).

But, you ask, how did it taste?

I gotta say, delicious. Semi-firm paste with a buttery, tangy, complex flavor. The recipe describes this cheese as ‘mild,’ but I’d call it closer to medium, probably due to the longer aging. Just soft enough to spread on a cracker. I’m not sure whether you’re meant to eat the rind (probably not), and the rind on my “Failure” wasn’t nice, but it was thin enough (if a bit dense) and just added to the complexity of the flavor.

This one I’ll definitely make again.

Yum!

-R