Cheese: A Connoisseurs Guide to the Worlds Best

Product Review

Filled with indispensable information from America’s foremost authority, Max McCalman, Cheese: A Connoisseur’s Guide to the World’s Best is your road map to exploring the world of fine cheese. As the maître fromager at New York’s acclaimed Picholine restaurant (the first in the country to offer a serious cheese program) and author of the widely acclaimed The Cheese Plate, McCalman has selected, tasted, and studied hundreds of cheeses, serving them to thousands of cheese lovers. And now he has created the definitive reference on the subject. Cheese profiles about 200 of the world’s best cheeses—and only the best—complete with all the practical information you could need and all the fascinating details you could want.

An incredible variety of real cheeses from around the world—including right here in the United States—are becoming more widely available. From distinguished Cabrales to oozing Reblochon and buttery Fontina d’Aosta, real cheese can rival the most spectacular creations of chefs, and all you have to do is buy the good stuff and serve it properly. Cheese is the ultimate guide to doing just that. Profiles of the cheeses include not only McCalman’s evocative descriptions but fascinating information on how each cheese is made, who the best producers are, similar cheeses to seek out, and even tips on what time of year the cheese is at its peak, how to store it, and how to serve it for maximum enjoyment.

Of course, wine is cheese’s favorite companion, so McCalman taste-tested thousands of wine and cheese combinations to offer unprecedented guidance on exactly which wines are most compatible with each and every cheese.

From the A of Aarauer Bierdeckel to the Z of Zamorano, Cheese is an illuminating, seductive guide to the very best that the world’s cheesemakers have to offer.

Customer Reviews

Average Customer Review

(18 customer reviews)

48 of 51 people found the following review helpful

A Course on Cheese, June 1, 2006

Garrett M. Mccord "Protogarrett" (Nor Cal) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cheese: A Connoisseur's Guide to the World's Best (Hardcover)

I love a good piece of stinky cheese. I enjoy taking it out of the fridge and letting its nasty old stank peel the paint off my walls, knockout my cat, and make the local children cry. It's how you know you gots yerself sum quality cheese right there.

Unfortuneatly, I must admit, my cheese knowledge is limited to about, oh, whatever I might have picked up from a cookbook or Food Network. Thank heavens for Max McCalman, may chiors sing his spoiled milk praises! For those who don't really know this guy, he is the man and fromager (cheese brainiac) who pretty much single handedly spearheaded the idea of presenting true artisinal cheeses, cheese courses, and giving cheese the kind of credit we give to wine here in America. He has become well known for his work in the New York restaurants Picholine and Artisinal, and luckilly for those of us not living shibby in New York, has gone out of his way to create a wonderful guide to the best of the best in his second book, Cheese: A...Read more

29 of 29 people found the following review helpful

Cheese graded on a 100 point scale? NO!, May 31, 2009

Chambolle (Bainbridge Island, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cheese: A Connoisseur's Guide to the World's Best (Hardcover)

UPDATE -- I strongly urge those considering this book to take a look at McCalman's newest work, "Mastering Cheese." It is far more comprehensive and informative. It does not utilize the "100 point" rating scale that I found such an unnecessary distraction in this volume. In short, "Mastering Cheese" is truly McCalman's magnum opus and a book I recommend without any reservation. Granted, this "Connoisseur's Guide" is an attractive book in some ways. For cheese lovers, its close up color photos of the featured cheeses will verge on soft core dairy porn.

But if you are going to buy just one reference work on cheese, the "Connoisseur's Guide" would not be it. I urge you to look instead at McCalman's "Mastering Cheese" -- which is his masterwork.

The "Connoisseur's Guide" reviewed here is a useful, albeit somewhat limited reference guide, as it highlights only a handful of the many cheeses of the world -- McCalman's hand picked selection of "The World's Best."...Read more

44 of 47 people found the following review helpful

The New Cheese Bible, September 30, 2005

P. M. Basta "CheeseBoy" (Santa Monica, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cheese: A Connoisseur's Guide to the World's Best (Hardcover)

This newest addition to Mccalman's offerings is by far the best and most comprehensive, timely reference to the cheeses of the world. It is the new "bible" as far as I'm concerned. He elaborates and builds upon his first book in a way that is illuminating and interesting, and , if even a bit constrained with his list of great cheeses , manages to present his picks in an assessible way. His chapter on wine parings is the best I've read. Truly this is a must have for anyone that has a passion for spoiled milk of the world.