matt

second base: torture

TEA HIVE

from PLOUGHMAN in Brooklyn

by Kyle ft. Andrew

Hi y'all, sorry that it’s been like a million years since our last cheese review. Jordaan has school and oops, I moved to Boston. Still have to check out the Boston cheese scene, but a couple weekends ago, I went down to New York, and my good pal Ian took me to the Ploughman cheese shop in Park Slope (because he wanted to know if I thought the cutie that worked there is gay - I voted no).

Anyhow, I bought some of this Tea Hive cheese and left half with Ian (“Ya it basically tastes like parm”), but took the other half home to take for a spin with my roomie Andrew.

So this cheese is basically a cheddary-type deal that’s been smeared with tea leaves and bergamot oil. And… yeah I mean it tastes like cheese smeared with tea. The cheese itself is okay - it tastes sharp in a sort of bitter, citrusy way (think of the bitterness of orange peel), and really pretty musty and meaty in its savouriness. Andrew described the meaty sharpness well as basically like soppressata (i.e. spicy Italian sausage). You do get a strong tea flavour, but only if you’ve bitten off a mouthful of rind.