11:34 AM CDT on Wednesday, July 16, 2008
By KIM PIERCE / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News
food@dallasnews.com
Molto Formaggio, Dallas' first shop devoted to artisanal cheese, notes on its blackboard: "Tasting a must. Buying optional."
At the new cheese shop Molto Formaggio, an Italian cow's milk cheese called Sottocenere al Tartufo (the large round adorned with leaves), takes center stage in one display.
How sly. Because if you are a cheese lover and the owners can get you to taste, resistance is futile.
I was thus broadsided recently when co-owner Michael Perlmeter scraped off a half-teaspoon sample of Carles Roquefort. The sheep's-milk blue melted on my tongue like the finest chocolate truffle, its briny, subtle flavor lodged in my brain for hours.
Research reveals that Carles Roquefort is made by Jacques Carles, who is nearly 100, and his daughter. It's considered by some cheese experts to be the finest Roquefort in Roquefort – in short, the finest in the world.
Even though it's $44.95 a pound, Mr. Perlmeter smiles and says that because the taste is so intense, you needn't buy much. He doesn't understand (or maybe he does) that someone like me will eat it spoonful after spoonful.
Molto Formaggio, which opened July Fourth weekend at Preston Royal Shopping Center, grows out of a passion for cheeses. The three families who own it – Mr. Perlmeter and wife, Rosemary; Tony and Christy Martinez; and Rodney and Ann Marie Roeske – were vacationing together in Florence, Italy, and one night, "after too much prosecco or too much brunello," Mr. Perlmeter says, they hatched the idea for the shop.
Four years later, you can walk through the door and find a selection of artisanal and high-quality industrial cheeses. Most of the artisanal cheeses are handmade from raw milk, Mr. Perlmeter says. The industrial cheeses are produced commercially from pasteurized milk.
Which you prefer is "purely a matter of palate," he says. "We don't push one over the other."
The cheeses come from around the world, and the country of origin is signified by a small flag next to a description of the cheese. Unlike cheeses sold in most supermarkets, selections are custom-cut to order. The only Texas cheese so far is a custom-made, creamy burrata from the Mozzarella Co.
The shop also sells all manner of items to go with cheese, from Italian pasta (including toasted-wheat orecchiette) to plum confit. The team imports BruCo (short for Bruno and Constantina) small-producer chocolates made with olive oil instead of butter and sells three kinds of bulk olive oil (bottles are provided and may be refilled) as well as fondue and raclette equipment.
A second Molto Formaggio is to open at Highland Park Village in September.
Kim Pierce is a Dallas freelance writer.
Molto Formaggio
Where: 6025 Royal Lane (at Preston Road)
Phone: 214-361-9191
Hours: 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday- Saturday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday
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Why is Raw Milk Underground?
Milk the way all mammals drink it from their mothers, the way people have been drinking it for thousands of years, the way much of the world still drinks it is fast becoming an illegal product, an illicit substance - as I recently discovered when I began to look for an economical way to feed my family's gallon a day habit.
Pasteurization, once developed to kill pathogens in wine and later found to increase the shelf life of factory produced dairy product has become the new milk "religion". Despite purported health benefits, and the simple right of consumers to purchase food directly from their producers; and despite the fact that more people died from raw tomatoes recently than get even sickened from raw milk, laws are being passed and agencies are enforcing the ban in trade of illegal milk.
Pasteurization, once developed to kill pathogens in wine and later found to increase the shelf life of factory produced dairy product has become the new milk "religion". Despite purported health benefits, and the simple right of consumers to purchase food directly from their producers; and despite the fact that more people died from raw tomatoes recently than get even sickened from raw milk, laws are being passed and agencies are enforcing the ban in trade of illegal milk.
