Modestly ambitious Appalachian is noteworthy

You might think that the richer the milk, the better it is for making cheese, but that's not so. At Virginia's Meadow Creek Dairy, where the herd consists of Jersey cows and Jersey crosses, the milk's high fat content presents a cheesemaking challenge.

What matters to cheesemakers is not just the volume of milk solids - the fat and the protein - but the ratio of those two components. Jersey milk has an especially high fat-to-protein ratio, ideal for butter producers but not so great for cheese.

Meadow Creek cheesemaker Helen Feete tried skimming some of the cream, but because the dairy doesn't pasteurize, she couldn't churn the cream into butter. (Butter made with raw cream would be illegal.) So she and her husband, Rick, began cross-breeding their Jerseys with other dairy breeds, such as Montbeliards, to improve the milk for cheesemaking.

The Feetes milk about 80 cows and make cheese only from March to December, when the herd is outdoors on pasture. Their washed-rind cheese, Grayson, has won many awards - I'm a big fan - but their tomme-style cheese, called Appalachian, preceded it and is finally catching up to it in popularity.

Helen describes a tomme is "just your generic cheese of the region" and says that has always been her modest ambition for Appalachian. Nothing fancy.

In fact, the cheese is more noteworthy than her description would suggest. After the curds form, they are cooked gently before they are drained of whey and molded. After a light pressing and a day-long brining, the 8-pound wheels go into the cellar, where they are sprayed with mold spores to encourage a bloomy rind to form.

Because Grayson is aged in the same space, the cellar is rife with Bacterium linens, the good bacteria encouraged to colonize its surface. Spraying Appalachian - as opposed to simply inoculating the milk in the vat - helps the mold compete with the bacteria, but Feete says she isn't aiming for a pristine Brie-like rind.

Matured for about 70 days, Appalachian has a thin natural rind overlaid with a powdery white bloom. The internal color is fantastic, a deep sunflower yellow from the carotene in the cows' diet. You rarely see such intense color in young cow's milk cheese.

The paste is dense, smooth and pliable, on the cusp between semisoft and semifirm. The aroma is shy, hinting at warm butter and cream, the flavor mild and buttery. This cheese coats your palate, like soft fudge.

A white wine with some texture would be a good match for Appalachian. A creamy Chardonnay without evident oak would probably work, but my choice was the 2008 Roland Schmitt Pinot Gris, a fragrant Alsatian white with a touch of sweetness.

Look for Appalachian at Cowgirl Creamery, Falletti Foods and Other Avenues in San Francisco, and at Oxbow Cheese Merchant in Napa.

Next up: The year in cheese.