15 March 2013: Sometime last last fall, Margaret and I were visiting the Rogue Creamery.  We picked up a number of our favorite Bleus, and they had a sample of Up in Smoke – a River’s Edge Chevre from Three Ring Farm in Logsden OR.  We liked it, and bought a couple of 4oz balls.  This is pasteurized cultured goat’s milk, smoked over maple, and wrapped in maplewood-smoked maple leaves.  We forgot about it until today, somewhere between 4-6 months’ later.  The cheese had mostly turned from white to a medium-dark honey-ash-brown, and Margaret was a bit concerned about some of the mold on the leaves.  I am a guy, so I figured we should try it out.  I like Brutal Blue from Rogue Creamery.  For me, it has a clear, clean, focused “punch”.  My thought at my first little taste of “Up in Smoke” was “This is the strongest and most powerful cheese I’ve ever tasted.”  It was body-shaking. Awesomely good.

After tasting it, Margaret commented on how, in comparison, the “Cave Man Blue” we also had was “mild and refreshing”.  Cave Man Blue is one of our top-favorite Blues – it has solid, multidimensional flavor, and crystals. Up in Smoke, aged like this, is a remarkable experience.