#11 - Caña de Oveja

Another cheese log!

I found this Caña de Oveja when grocery shopping for Christmas dinner with my mom (which also explains the goofy set up for this photo). As you may be able to tell by the photo, this cheese was very similar to the buche de chèvre I have written about previously. It still had the three distinct layers, but this cheese was slightly more bitter, and the inner layer was a bit more stiff.  Being being a sheep's milk cheese, it was more tangy and "grassier" than the goat cheese I had tried before.

We enjoyed it with some celebratory champagne and a crusty baguette, and it was quite delicious!

The Library of Cheese on the Cowgirl Creamery website says:

"Resembling a French Bucheron, this soft-ripened sheep cheese log hails from Murcia, an orchard-thick mountainous region of southeastern Spain. The region is one of climatic diversity, at times hot and arid and at other times, benefiting from the balmy breezes buffeting in from the Mediterranean Sea, and is known for engendering high-quality goat milk products. However, this is a sheep milk offering from Lorenzo Abellan's farm -- the same man responsible for Cana de Cabra -- and Cana de Oveja is quite possibly Spain's first soft-ripened sheep milk log ever.

Blanketed with a cottony white mold, the cheese immediately under the rind is ecstatically gooey but gives way to a flakier, crumblier center. With notes of tangy butter in the paste, the cheese will intensify the older it gets."