Beemster Gouda XO

TASTING NOTES FROM THE CURATOR

The Beemster Gouda XO is made with the best Dutch cow milk, giving this cheese the best and creamiest quality. It’s aged for around 26 months in wooden planks in a historic stone warehouse. It has a gorgeous ochre color, and its texture is firm and crumbly, but still very creamy.

It is a robust cheese, with flavor notes of toasted pecan, butterscotch, caramel, and whiskey. It’s a delicious cheese, creamy and buttery, and will have you looking for it often.

PREPARATION AND PAIRINGS

The Beemster Gouda XO is great to serve on your cheese platters, with figs, olives, honey roasted nuts, and dried fruits. It’s also great to shave over apple pie, or over some vanilla ice cream if you’re feeling adventurous. Pair with a dark beer.

A STORY OF COOPERATION

Beemster is a farmer-owned cooperative founded in 1901, but its story goes as far back as the early 17th century. This was the time the Dutch reclaimed an area that was a coastal lagoon, and turned it into a pasture filled with nutrients, where they would let their herds graze, and therefore produce some of the best milk in the world.

The cooperative was put up by farmers to protect the land, and also to establish standards and quality that would become the trademark of Beemster Premium Dutch Cheese. This quality has never diminished. To this day, Beemster still uses brine that is traced back to the mother brine from 1901, they still stir curds by hand, and they still age their cheeses slowly and naturally in a historic stone warehouse. Though they have modernized some parts of production, the essence remains the same, and they continue to produce some of the best and creamiest cheeses.

Storage Instructions

Cheeses (except brined ones in jars) should be stored in the crisper or the butter drawer of a refrigerator, not on the shelves themselves. This is to help regulate their temperature and humidity levels—and prevents the formation of mold. Once opened, they should not be kept in their original packaging. Semi-hard cheeses (including blues) should ideally be wrapped in cheese paper after opening. An alternative is to wrap them tightly in parchment paper to allow them to breathe, then loosely in aluminum foil to keep moisture out. Don’t forget to write up a label with the date you first opened the package. Replace the parchment paper every time you