Christine is the chef and the boss behind CAV, a relatively new Wine Bar and restaurant. The atmosphere edges upon pretentious, with dim lighting and long tables and "fancy food". Fortunately, this "fancy" food is delicious and beautifully-presented enough that no yuppies can bother me while I am consuming it.
The best thing about CAV, for me, is that while they are a wine bar and have an excellent and widely ranged selection of wines, with many knowledgeable recommendations and suggested "pairings", they also have an INCREDIBLE selection of cheeses and similarly impressive knowledge.
The wait staff is spunky, prepared, and intellgent. The service has always been very good and knowledgeable. And after my conversation with, Christine I know why.
Every morning, Christine conducts a rigorous line-up. The entire Restaurant staff goes over the menu, spending time on any changes made to the wine list, the menu, or the cheese plate. Once they have familiarized and re-familiarized themselves with everything, Christine quizzes them. She quizzes them on ingredients used, good wine recommendations, the background and details about every single cheese.
She says she buys her cheeses through CheeseWorks West (a company I have contacted and plan to talk to next Tues.!), a great local company with a nice staff and excellent cheese selections.
What is unique about Christine's goals concerning her cheese plate is that, unlike many other local restaurants that try to present locally made cheeses, Christine presents very few, if any (there are none on the menu right now) California cheeses, preferring to represent cheeses from around the globe or cheeses from smaller, lesser known farms in order to introduce people to new things and give exposure to unique cheeses. She admits that there are some very good local cheeses but fels that they are being well-represented in all the other restaurants. She sites a few countries in particular, New Zealand, Spain, and of course France, as being where she looks to for a lot of her cheses. She also recalls that she currently has a great Gouda from Ireland!
She says she tries to have about 16 cheeses on the menu at once and to maintain a good balance of different styles of cheeses. She recalls that, since the restaurant opens, she must have had at least 50 different cheeses in circulation on the cheese plate. She likes to have a couple of each of cow, goat, sheep, and mixed milk cheeses as well as representing some raw and some pasteurized, some washed rind, some fresh, and some blue cheeses. She admits that the hardest to sell are the pungent blue and goat cheeses. She tries to have at least two of each of theese, of different, unique, and approachable varieties, at once. She thinks it is important to introduce people to theese kinds of cheeses. She says she sells a lot of riper, stronger cow and sheep's milk cheeses and soft blue and goat cheeses.
I asked Christine if she herself like stinky, pungent cheeses. She said she does, in moderation. She continued to say that, as a chef and food lover, there are VERY few things she will turn down in terms of food. She is willing to taste anything. She also admits that she has stopped having regular meals and instead ends up snacking on restaurant food all day long, including cheese.
Christine said they do not obssess too much about trying to pair wines with cheeses, feeling that the two are really their own thing and that it is a matter of taste. Yet, she feels that what most people say, which is that red wine goes better with cheese than white, is wrong. She thinks white wine goes better with cheese, in general. She thinks soft, triple cream cheeses are best with sparkling wines and that pecorino and similar cheeses are good with red wine.
I asked her if there are any difficulties, as a restaurant with many other things to take care of, with storing the cheese properly. She said that, as it turns out, they store the cheese in the wine cellar and that it works out perfectly because the two require similarly temperature-controlled areas.
In the end, Christine said that her job is fun, although very hard and definitly not for everybody. She loves it because she takes pleasure both in food and in running things and creating things and being in control. She likes to pop out of the kitchen now and then and meat the diners. She said that working with food is quite a lifestyle. She invited me to please stop by the restaurant and let the wait staff know when I'm there so she can "pop" out and meet me.
I am looking forward to meeting her in person and getting tasting the delicious food creations and cheeses of CAV.
Below I will leave you with CAV's cheese menu:
Seal Bay – Tasmania, Australia
Cow’s milk, washed rind, soft texture, triple cream
Brillat-Savarin - Normandy, France
Cow’s milk triple cream, soft ripened white bloomy
rind
Brillo di Treviso - Italy
Cow’s milk, wine wash, semi-firm texture
Sao Jorge – Azores, Portugal
Raw cow’s milk, semi-hard texture
Quebec Vintage Cheddar - Canada
Cow’s milk, semi-hard texture
Vento d’Estate - Treviso, Italy
Cow’s milk, semi-hard texture, aged in straw
Grayson – Virginia, USA
Washed rind raw cow’s milk, semi-soft texture, pasture
grazed
Raclette – Jura, France
Raw cow’s milk, semi-firm texture
Sweet-Grass-“Thomasville-Tomme”-–-
Georgia, USA
Raw.cow’s.milk,.semi-soft-texture
Parmigiano Reggiano - Modena, Italy
Raw organic cow’s milk, hard texture
Cabecou- St. Martin, France -
Goat’s.milk,-soft-texture,.washed.with.plum.-
brandy,-leaf.wrapped
Nevat - Pujol, Spain
Goat’s milk, soft texture
Torta del Casar- Spain
Sheep’s milk, wash rind, soft texture
Manchego - Spain
Raw sheep’s milk, hard texture
Pecorino “Grand Old Man” - Tuscany, Italy
Sheep’s milk, hard texture
A selection of fine artisanal cheeses
Selection of three 16
Selection of five 27
Cheese platter 85
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