Author Topic: Tomme Crayeuse  (Read 2715 times)

Laughingfrog

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Tomme Crayeuse
« on: April 26, 2010, 01:23:50 AM »
Tomme Crayeuse is a raw-milk cheese from the Savoie region of France. If any of you ever have a chance to try it, TRY IT! It is phenomenal. It is a new recipe, from 1995, by affineur Max Schmidhauser.  I want to make  cheese like this! Here's what Murray's (where I ordered mine) has to say about it:
This chalky tomme could be just another Tomme de Savoie-wannabe. Produced in Savoie, it's got that dank, mold-dappled rind and the same mountain-fed cow milk, but two stages of aging catapult it into mushroomy epiphany. First, it lounges in the sauna, warm and saturated with humidity to loosen the flesh into marshmallow cream. Then, a visit to a cooler but equally moist cave teases out those earthy, lactic inclinations, preserving an inner core of milky crumble. The final wheel is pure mushroom butter with a rind smattered with gorgeous powdery yellow mold, the result of cellulose in the cows' diet. The intense richness of flavor is deflected by a spicy red Syrah.
I have never heard of a 'sauna' stage in ripening. If any of you have been to the area, and have any insight into it, please let us know. The thing that was so interesting about it (aside from the unbelievable taste) is that it is chalky and unripened in the center, almost like a chaource, but it is a tomme... So...how do they do that?

iratherfly

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Re: Tomme Crayeuse
« Reply #1 on: May 04, 2010, 07:30:23 AM »
That's funny, I just saw that cheese TODAY for the first time in Whole Foods. I actually have a couple of friends at Murray's (It's local store for me). I can ask them more about it. As far as I know the sauna is a very humid and higher temp aging that builds up the mold very fast. (Like doing a slip skin on purpose) Because of that, it also ages the outside of the cheese before the inside can catch up - kind of like frying a vegetable on high heat: burned outside and not done yet inside. It's really a Tomme with a wild Camembert-like aging process Let me know if you find out more!

Laughingfrog

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Re: Tomme Crayeuse
« Reply #2 on: May 12, 2010, 11:08:59 PM »
Oh that makes sense... I would love to know the temps they use for the high phase... Did you try it yet? It is so good it leaves Savoie in the dust....I actually blended part of  the rind to get that lovely yellow mold it has on a tomme I was making that week, and it worked. I haven't opened it up yet though.

iratherfly

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Re: Tomme Crayeuse
« Reply #3 on: May 19, 2010, 04:29:16 AM »
I would love to know too... must be a close guarded secret. I purchased a chunk of it last week and it was gone fairly quickly!

I love the idea of using an existing rind as a mother culture for other rind but I never do that because I am always afraid that since I don't know what's in my cheese, I won't be able to repeat that without another piece of the original or a remaining piece of my results.

How did you actually do that? Did you put the rind in water and smeared it? Or just rubbed it dry? wedged it by fourse to the surface and waited for it to catch onto the rest of the cheese?

I am not in the midst of creating my own crazy rinds and experimenting with some very funky cultures and yeasts. Amazing stuff so far.

Offline ArnaudForestier

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Re: Tomme Crayeuse
« Reply #4 on: July 12, 2011, 11:12:44 PM »
Old thread, new cheese (to me).  OMG!  This is an extraordinary cheese!  I MUST capture this rind and use it.  Or try the process on my tomme grises, the last of which has naturally developed a tinge of linens, competing with the mucor. 
- Paul

iratherfly

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Re: Tomme Crayeuse
« Reply #5 on: July 30, 2011, 06:08:15 PM »
Indeed extraordinary. The issue with replicating it is that the make and affinage are very difficult and are close guarded trade secret. I know that they are using a cool and warm aging periods (but don't know the temp, RH and the sequence and length of events). I also think they apply the rind cultures in stages so nothing is straightforward about this cheese. Yellow staining on the rind comes from cellulose and is a testament to some incredibly rich animal diet too.