What a friend we have in cheeses!

Manchego is one of my wife's favorite cheeses that we get every time we go to the wine and cheese joint on Court St. It is a mild cheese made from sheeps milk from the La Mancha section of Spain. Only from the Manchega sheep as well. This semi-firm cheese is aged in caves for three to six months before it is shipped. It is usually shapped in a four pound barrel shape.

We enjoy it with a rich Rioja that natural fits the olives, cheese and cured meats that we get on the tapa's menu.

I voted for it in the poll.

What a friend we have in cheeses!

Patty Melt who is Miss Wisconsin 2009 has refused to cut her hair until her hero Brett Farve returns to her beloved Packers.

Now that he has signed with the Vikings she is even refusing to cut the cheese.

What a friend we have in cheeses!

One of the quick cheese tricks you can do with cheez whiz is to take a can with you on a date. Then when you start to cough you pull it out like an inhaler and squirt some cheese into your mouth to stop the attack. If your date freaks out then the chances of her letting you squirt something into her mouth is very very slim.

Also popular with owners of rare clumbers.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

What a friend we have in cheeses!

No historical tour would be complete without a visit to Mount Cheesemore in Madison Wisconsin which was voted the cheesiest city in the United States ten years in a row. Unlike the more famous Mt Rushmore, this monument celebrates the cheeziest of our founding fathers:

Philip Livingston, Elbridge Gerry and Button Gwinnett.

What a friend we have in cheeses!

Hey I hear that Brett Farve has just signed with the Vikings!

I think he is laughing at your cheese.

Did I tell you lately that the Giants are gonna win the Superbowl?

What a friend we have in cheeses!

Cheese brings together all races, creeds and colors. Everybody loves cheese.

Ricpic sent me this t-shirt along with his vote. Shalom brother.

I still think you should try some fotina.

What a friend we have in cheeses!

Cheese is our friend. Beyond being the perfect complement to a well grilled burger or a delicious snack with crackers and wine it has so many other uses.

In certain remote villages of Sicily it often serves as a substitute for expensive breast enhancement surgery. Once the couple is married and the husband finds out that his new wife is not so generously endowed, he at least has some cheese.

More often then not he is content.

What a friend we have in cheeses!

What a friend we have in cheeses!

There were many suggestions as to cheeses we should have included in our poll. I know, I know but I can only use five at a time because I think that is the limit on photos I can post. So I made an eclectic choice. I am only sorry I couldn't find a really cool photo of toe cheese. And I really looked for one!

Anyway the best cheeses all have one thing in common. You need some really good milk.

So to speak.

You cheesey bastards.

So it comes down to this. It is all about the cheese. Which is your favorite. Now there are so many different kinds of cheese and I can't pick them all. I also didn't want to make it all Italian so I left out a lot of my favorites like assiago and fotina and even mozzarella. But take it for what it is worth and tell me your favorite cheese. The nominees:

Brie for all you elitist mo's that visit this site.

Gouda if it is Gouda enough for you.

Swiss because you don't want to be called French.

Manchego the great Spanish cheese

Government cheese the favorite of all the liberals out there in the blogosphere.

Pick your favorite cheese.

So long and thanks for the cheese.

So yesterday my wife gets a call in the store. One of our customers is a writer and went to a conference in Italy before her next book tour. You know a promotional exercise. She was calling us from JFK airport because it seems that the airline had lost her luggage. So she had no idea of when her stuff would be returned to her. Now we had started this practice of cutting a very limited number of dresses, no more than 20 in a particular fabric. We would show a sample and the girls could pre buy it. Now the reason why that is important is that we only cut so many of a specific size. Let's say 3 size one and 3 size two. So if you don't get your size you are out of luck because there are no more. We had cut this green dress that looked really great. We basically sold 15 out of 20 before it even got to the store and this girl got one of them. She told us that she got a million compliments on the dress and it was her absolute favorite and if it was lost she had to replace it no matter what. Luckily one of the two we have left was her size and we put it on the side for her. She came right from the airport to buy it. That's when we heard the rest of the story.

You see on her way back from Italy she decided to smuggle in a huge wheel of Parmesan cheese that she put in her luggage. Fragrant Parmesan. So now that her luggage is sitting on the hot tarmac somewhere all of her wardrobe for her bookstore is going to sell like happy hour at the Olive Garden. So she is waiting a couple of days but she thinks she will have to replace a lot of stuff fast. She will be back on Friday. All I could think of to say is, "So long and thanks for the cheese."