Still very cold here in the southern portion of the Champagne district. We were up early and off to Maisons-Les-Chaource for a visit to a goat farm. This is a single mom whose kids are now grown, who decided to raise goats to sell milk and make cheese. Before starting her own farm, she worked with another female cheese maker for a year to learn the trade. She then started her own goat farm. When her children were younger, she had more goats but says by herself she can only handle 22 goats. She has two males while the remaining 20 are female. When she has a "kid", she usually sells them to keep her group size stable. She raises three breeds of goat and milks them twice a day. She makes fresh cheese or fromage blanc as well as several types of aged goat cheese. The older the cheese, the harder or firmer the texture. Whole goat milk is used, then natural rennet is used to cuddle the milk. If she cools it, the curds form quite quickly. If she "cooked" us, which means she maintains the milk at the goat's body temperature for up to 36 hours, it curdles more slowly. She has different molds she uses as each shape given the cheese a different flavor. After we saw the goats and watched her make cheese, she gave us samples of each of her cheeses. All her cheeses were better than any other goat cheese I've ever had! She did let us buy from her, as she had missed her market day to give us a tour. However, we can't bring it back to the States because of import rules (oh my, that means we'll have to eat it this week-too bad!).
After the goat farm, we were off to Les Riceys for lunch at Le Magny. As this is champagne country, we had champagne with our lunch of an amuse Busche (avocado mousse), salad greens with fried goat cheese rounds, and roast duck breast with multiple vegetables. Dessert was raspberry ice cream (or semi-freddo, we couldn't decide which) with a mix of fresh fruit.
On the road again, www were off to Urville to visit Domaine Drappier, one of the finest but less known champagne house. The house was started right after WWII in a 12th century monastery (the monastery still exists but is 15 miles away). All their vintage champagnes are stored down in the rock cellar. Drappier produces 1.5 million bottles of champagne a year, using Pinot noir, Chardonnay and pinot menuire grapes they grow themselves. They were very kind! We tasted four different champagnes at the end of tour after which several people bought champagne.
Back to the bus and on to Paris. So far, the only issues we have seen in regards to the strike, has been regarding fuel as in potential shortage. Apparently neither the government nor the people seem willing to back down. In case you have not heard, the French are protesting the government's raising the national retirement age. Tomorrow we start our cooking classes. We are excited! I did manage to catch a cold though, so I am going to bed early!
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