Uh, I don’t know about that. I mean, my second favorite drink in the whole wide world is coffee (first is water – yeah I am boring) and I can’t get enough of various types of cheese (check my last grocery bill and you’ll see LOTS of different cheese in there). I have not really thought of mixing the two together, have you?
This girl in Canada, Laura Perry, thinks otherwise and judges of the Eastern Regional Barista Championship in Montreal agree with her! The story featured in Ottawa Citizen narrates her victory:
Mascarpone cheese is not the first ingredient the average coffee drinker would put into an espresso. But Kanata’s Laura Perry is no ordinary coffee aficionado, using the unusual concoction to win the Eastern Regional Barista Championship this week in Montreal.
The 22-year-old’s victory will make her the only Ottawa resident to compete in October at the Canadian National Barista Championships, the Grey Cup of competitive coffee-making in Canada.
The drink, named Mascarpone Macchiato, is a shot of espresso marked with a bit of steam milk. It is blended with a variety of ingredients, including whipped mascarpone cheese, sugar cane and cinnamon bark.
For those who wince at cheese and coffee, Perry says she uses mascarpone for its light cream qualities. “It doesn’t really taste like cheese.”
For someone who likes cheese, I am pretty ignorant about a lot of types and I have not heard of mascarpone before. I found this at Wikipedia:
Mascarpone is a triple-cream cheese (though more accurately a lightly-whipped cream) made from crème fraîche, denatured with tartaric acid. Mascarpone is milky-white in color and is easily spread. When fresh, it smells like milk and cream. It is used in various dishes of the Lombardy region of Italy, where it is a specialty. It is a main ingredient of tiramisu.
I feel a bit stupid as I love tiramisu but now I understand how mascarpone can go well with coffee. I wonder if we’ll ever get to taste the likes of this coffee?
Originally posted on June 22, 2008 @ 8:03 am