The Joy of Cheese Presents a Sheepy September

September 2009 is a bitch of month to try and schedule events. Labor Day is very very late, and Rosh Hashanah is somewhat early. That leaves a teensy tiny little window to schedule tastings. But every problem is an opportunity, so we're going to focus the entirety of our tasting themes on sheep cheese this month. Everyone knows Manchego, Roquefort, and Pecorino, but there's so much more to the story. We'll tell it in three separate events.
September 15 at 6:30 at Nectar Wine Bar: The 8 Best Sheep Cheeses in New York City
The 8 on the 8th series returns from summer hiatus with a survey course of great sheep cheeses from France, Italy and Spain (of course) as well as those from less renown ports like New Jersey, Portugal and England. Tickets are $25 and you pay for your wine as you go. There will be a flight of wines chosen by Jai Jai Greenfield, owner of Nectar Wine Bar. Nectar Wine Bar is at 2235 Frederick Douglass Blvd (121st St.) . Advance tix are available at Brown Paper Tickets, http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79470
September 17 at 7 at d.b.a Brooklyn: Cheeses of Spain & Portugal, Beers from ???
Okay, not all the cheeses here will be from sheep's milk but most of them will be. The Iberian peninsula is a fantastic epicenter of sheep cheese production and we will investigate some cornerstone cheeses and several exotic ones as well. Ray Deter will present six beers to chosen to match our six cheeses. There will also be fruit, a mystery cheese and program notes. Tickets are $20 (it's a one hour tasting) and available via Brown Paper Tickets, http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79469
September 22 at 7 at Stella: Not Cheap Cheese, Sheep Cheese!
One of the most underrated--okay Frank Bruni, overlooked--aspects of sheep's milk cheese is its companionability with a wide variety of wines. This will be our focus at the next Stella tasting. We will present nine extraordinary sheep's milk cheeses with four superb wines. I'll talk about the cheese and Peter Jamros will detail the deep dark secrets of the wine. Tickets are $40 (it's a two hour event) and available via Brown Paper Tickets, http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79468

For more information, contact me at thejoyofcheese@gmail.com.

-MJ