Thursday, January 26, 2017

How to eat French Cheeses - a minefield of etiquette in France

Today in France, there are over 400 cheese varieties and the French are the largest consumers of cheese in the world.  Not having cheese everyday is like the French saying " A meal without cheese is like a beautiful woman with only one eye,



a Cheese being made is only one part of the a story, from there it needs to be aged properly and that's called Affinage and there are shops that buy the cheese from the producers and then age it and these are the only people to buy from.

As far as etiquette, cheese with a meal is always eaten after the email meal and before dessert. One never eats cheese with crackers ( in France) but only with bread, normally dark bread. Also, when cutting cheese there are strict ways of doing it and not, but the most important is when you are faced with a pie-shaped cheese, you never cut the nose off ( the most favorable part) but cut it at an angle so everyone gets a slice that had part of the nose. 
With soft cheese, the French also eat the rind ( another very favorable part) and with the hard one, most do not, but you'll get points with the locals if you do.