Cocoa Cardona

Chocolate and cheese unite beautifully in this week’s cheese, an award-winning American Original Carr Valley’s Cocoa Cardona.

Made in 8-lb. wheels, from goat milk, it features delicious Cardona cheese aged and rubbed with cocoa powder. The cocoa powder infuses the smooth and snowy cheese with a subtle chocolate flavor, which is balanced by the cheese's natural sharpness. The cocoa flavor is subtle, the rind a lovely brown, and the end result like nothing you've ever tasted.

It took 1st Place at the 2004 and 2nd in 2006 American Cheese Society Competition and Best of Class & Overall Second Runner-Up out of 1,000 entries in the 2005 U.S. Championship Cheese Contest and a 1st Place Ribbon at the American Cheese Society Competition in Burlington, Vermont in2007.

Snuggly situated among the softly flowing green hills and fertile pastures of central Wisconsin, the Carr Valley Cheese Company has been making cheese for over a century. Sid Cook, the current and fourth-generation owner, is one of a small group of certified Master Cheesemakers in the United States. He, along with the rest of the Carr Valley Cheese Company, makes a select variety of cheeses. From traditional and smoked Cheddars to Colbys and more unknown varieties like Benedictine, Carr Valley Cheese Company pairs old-world traditions with creativity to make each cheese.

Here is an serving suggestion from Jeanne Carpenter writer of the Cheese Underground Blog “Carr Valley Cocoa Cardona: here's another dessert possibility. Place a slice on a dessert plate and then swirl chocolate around it (even the old stand by of Hershey's Syrup works if you don't have any frou frou chocolate sauce in your fridge). When you dip the Cocoa Cardona cheese in the chocolate, it kicks it up one more flavor notch. Totally recommend this instead of ice cream.”

I sell this cheese for $24.00/ lb at La Fromagerie D’ Acadiana.