On Secrets.

It's that time again...CHEESE TIME!
I had my friend and fellow cheese conoisseur write about his favorite kind of cheese, so here are his thoughts:

Hello everyone- my name is Andrew Van Gorp. I recently discovered that my lover was cheating on me with some harlot named Signe, and they were BLOGGING about their exploits together... I was shattered. I thought that what I had with Cheese was special, but I guess we are all weak for Cheese when it comes down to it. In all seriousness, very recently I had my first encounter with my FAVORITE cheese of all time. I know, that's a big statement. Before said encounter I had always thought that all cheeses were equal in my eyes...how wrong I was. This cheese was called "Goat Gouda". Apparently these farmers were using goat milk to make gouda cheese! Imagine my ecstasy to find out that these cheese scientists had, in effect, merged together some of my favorite kind of cheeses into what would become, unbeknownst to me, the most impressive illegitimate love child ever given to this world! To my chagrin, goats are also considered very sustainable! (See link below). Okay- you're delicious description. The cheese's appearance when first freshly sliced into is common to any other gouda. It has a creamy white color that leans a little closer towards the peach color range than usual gouda coloring. The small crags and breaks in the cheese add to its visual appeal- easily pleasing the eyes of the rock climbers amongst you- it is a mountain face of saborevacity(a spanglish word I just made up). The first bite was the best (as usual for taste tests... after so much cheese the flavor "sinks in" to your taste buds and loses clarity.) When I first placed the cheese into my mouth I was slapped with beddable gouda- I found myself searching for any remnant of goat cheese! Where was the goat in goat gouda?!? I was extremely disappointed...and then...slowly- ever so slowly- what is that?- a small tingling flavor at the back of my tongue appeared. Could it be? Was the prodigal goat found at last? It was it was indeed! The goat cheese half of goat gouda finally found it's way into my salacious mind. The texture of the now flavor-balanced cheese was not to be stood up. As you bight down into it, the cheese crumbles regretfully against your teeth. It isn't just some goat cheese to be mooted into nothingness! It holds to its goudish ancestry in the texture department. The familiar "stones" appear as you wrestle the cheese- tiny bits of cheese that add that almost pear-like grit. These tiny rebel armies keep the cheese interesting as you chew it up. If I had to describe this cheese in a few words to sum up, I would describe it as mollifying, expressive, and balanced. I LOVE THIS CHEESE! I would hope you would all try it. Also, thanks to Signe for letting me add to her magnificent blog! I hope you all keep reading- I know I will!

I love this website called PostSecret, and one of it's messages is compassion towards others, which I thought would fit in nicely with the love part of this blog...

In 2005, Frank Warren created several hundred pre-adressed postcards instructing people to illustrate a secret on the postcard and send it to him.

He left the postcards in coffee shops, libraries, and art museums for people to find. Soon enough, people started sending in their secrets and Frank Warren started a blog on blogspot.com displaying 10 new secrets every sunday. The site has grown since then, and now displays approximately 20 secrets every Sunday. Since the start of the blog, Warren has published  5 books exploding with secrets from several different countries and in several different lanuages, even braille! The secrets range from grotesquely sexual to hilarious and make stops everywhere in between.
It takes a lot for someone to share their secret with the entire world, and the fact that millions have already participated in this movement makes me think that everybody in the world is a lot more connected thatn we could ever imagine. Someone all the way over in France could submit a secret in, then it gets published in a book, and there is at least one person who reads that secret thinking "I know exactly how that feels" or"Yeah, me too." Frank Warren said "Every single person has at least one secret that could break your heart. If we could just remember this, I think there would be a lot more compassion and tolerance in the world." I believe this, too and try to live this mission.
www.postsecret.com is a good read and I would highly recommend giving it a visit sometime. The secrets will definitely pique your interest, and you might even find one that you identify with!

Enjoy the website and some good cheese this week!
Much  Love,
Sig.

All the Small Things

Ok, I know I was supposed to post a few days ago, but I have been getting swamped with homework and registration for next semester and just everything! So, yeah, I have some time to post now and I will finally give you a post about cheese, because I know that is the only reason you ever started reading this blog.
Habanero Cheese:
This stuff is hot! Like, really hot!
If you are a guy reading this, just imagine Taylor Swift or Jessica Alba or some swedish supermodel and this cheese is ten times hotter than all of them!
If your a girl, think of Dante from 'Sex and the City' and, yes, this cheese is even hotter than him...and completely attainable!
haha, ok, just kidding.
I tried this cheese last week with a friend and it was very spicy...go figure, right? The name couldn't possibly be a prelude to the taste or anything...
Even though I am not one for spicy foods, I thoroughly enjoyed this cheese (in very small portions of course) There is one thing i would like to note about this cheese: it is a lot creamier than the Wisconsin Pepper Jack I featured earlier. Me, being extrmemly inexperienced in the dairy department, didn't believe there could be a creamier cheese than WI PJ. Alas, I have spoken to soon and the Habanero trumps the WI PJ in creaminess any day. Habanero is perfect for a cheese and crackers snack because it is best in small amounts.
Cheesemeter Rating: 3/5 - I would prefer something with the same level of creaminess or more but I did not like setting my mouth aflame for the sake of writing this blog.

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Now for some lovin'!
Like I said, this week has been hell with homework by the stack, late nights, and class registration. But no matter how exhausted and stressed I am, there is one simple, little thing that never fails to brighten my day. I love it when people hold the door open for others! It is such a wonderful little gesture! I think that holding doors open is kind of a lost generosity in society, but I have been noticing it more often here at Northland and I try real hard to hold doors open for others. But, as with any small thing, they tend to get easily forgotten. I really appreciate it when people hold the door for me, so I am making a promise right here, right now to always hold the door open! It's something small that I can do to spread kindness and make the world just a tiny bit brighter.
I put a post it note on my desk to make sure I actually stick to this promise.

Your mission#1: hold the door open for at least one person a day for the next week.
Your Mission #2: Tell the next person you talk to what you appreciate about them or just say 'I love you'. You will make someone's day :)
I love all of you reading this!
Peace,
-Sig.

Home on the Trail

You don't have to know me for very long before you hear about my one passion (besides cheese, of course). It's a place located far from any real civilization, a place where cell phone service and internet connections don't reach, and a place where I have never felt more alive...

I have been working at Wilderness Canoe Base (WCB)since the wee age of fourteen and will probably work there for several years to come. I thought it apprpriate to talk about WCB since I am heading up there this weekend. It truly is my home and a place that is very close to my heart. The best thing about WCB is the people. I honestly consider every single staff member my family and I would do anything in the world for them. I couldn't even begin to tell you all of the wonderful things the Wilderness staff have done for me, but here are three fun stories that stick out in my mind:

1. Last year as a senior in high school I was elected as one of five princesses of my school. Being on this royal court meant that I was to participate in this 'Coronation' ceremony at the end of our Winter Week (Like Home Coming, only 100 times more extravegant). The ceremony was at ten in the morning on a friday - slightly inconvenient timing for most people with jobs, right? Well, I thought about knighting the entire WCB staff, but that really just seemed like a lot of stress for everybody, so I just picked one person from the staff to knight. This guy that I decided to knight happened to be living a good seven hour drive away so I wasn't really expecting him to make it...and then he showed up at the Ceremony right on time after having woken up before the sun to get there! And what made this situation even better? He brought another one of my friends from Wilderness to the ceremony. I tried to tell these guys how much it meant to me that they were there, but I don't think that they really understand, so here it is again:

A and C, you guys being at my Coronation made me feel like the most important girl in the world! I didn't expect you to come and then you did and you drove all that way to be there and it made me feel so special. I will remember this for the rest of my life because I think it is the most important I have ever felt. Thank you for being there on that day, I hope it was worth the drive :)

2. This summer one of my friends made me obsessed with this song called Skinny Love by Bon Iver. He played Skinny Love on his guitar on a daily basis and once in a while he would come into the kitchen (I was a cook this past summer) and just start playing it for me! This is another one of those moments that I will remember for years to come because it made me feel special somehow. It was just a song, but it really did make my summer.

J - Bon Iver's version of Skinny Love will never even compare to yours. Please keep singing it for me, because your version is the best song I have ever heard.

3. I turned eighteen this summer and for an entire week prior to my birthday the Wilderness staff sang 'happy birthday' to me at least once at every meal. I'm sure they got pretty sick of singing that song by the end of the week, but it really did mean a lot to me. I mean, they must really just love me if they sing me happy birthday for a week straight, right? Well, that was my thinking anyway. They decided to take it a step further and sing me one last happy birthday song at dinner the day after my birthday as there was only staff at the base. And you know what else they did?! They got my FAVORITE ice cream of all time all the way up the Gunflint Trail for dessert! Yeah, that made me feel pretty fricken special! Again, a week that will forever be making me smile as it sits in the back of my mind.

This is why I love Wilderness. Every memory I have associated with this camp and the staff is a memorable one. WCB means so much to me that I can't even put into words how much I love everybody from that camp.
Go make some love happen today!
Make people around you feel special becuase they won't soon forget it!
-Sig.    
p.s. Okay, it is one in the morning and I knew I needed to post something; however, the cheese portion of this blog will not be happening tonight as the is the fourth night in a row that I have stayed up way to late.
p.p.s I will be heading up to WCB for the weekend so I will not be posting, check for another post on Monday night. I promise, the next post will have cheese info galore!

Taking the Cake

Tonight, there was supposed to be a small party for four of my friends that have birthdays coming up. I, with the help of some friends, made a big chocolate cake last night in my dorm's kitchen for the party tonight. I made this cake from scratch, put tons of frosting on it, and about an inch thick layer of rainbow sprinkles. It was beautiful and I was very excited to present it to my friends tonight; however, sometimes things don't got as planned and I figured this out upon looking in the fridge to find someone had stolen my entire cake! It was gone, completely gone, like it had never been created in the first place! So, as you can imagine, I was very sad and angry. But this is a Love blog, and here is the beautiful part that came out of this ugly situation: I realized that I have found some very good friends. They knocked on every door in the dorm to find the cake (or, at least to find my cake pan) and when no one confessed we walked to the County Market together and bought a tub of ice cream to share! It turned into a great night of bonding and opened my eyes to all of the beauty and wonderful people that surround me on a daily basis. I am truly blessed to have these people in my life.
Also, I now know that for every one person who steals a cake, there are at least ten people who will make sure you don't miss it.  

Now, lets got down to business...to defeat the huns! Just kidding, let's talk about the thing that everybody loves, CHEESE!!!

Today, I am featuring a Wisconsin original: Wisconsin Pepperjack

WI Pepper Jack cheese uneqivocally blends a decadent creamy texture with a peppery kick. Some may be hesitant to try this cheese on account of it's spicy nature, but I can tell you right now that it is merely a mild spice. Enough pepper to bring out the flavor but not near enough to make me stop eating it any time soon (trust me, I am very sensative to hot things and often shy away from them).

When asked how one would describe this cheese, my fellow cheese heads had this to say:

"Creamy, peppery, and all around delicious!" 

"Spicy, very flavorful."

Upon discussing what this cheese would be best with, most said it was best plain (this is where I also stand) while others said that it tastes especially good on top of Ranch flavored Wheat Thins or melted over chicken. 

Well, there you have it, sample it at your next party but be sure to buy more than you think you'll need because it will go fast! 

Cheesemeter Rating: 4/5. 

ttys, 

Sig.

P.s. These cheese reviews will get better. I am just in the process of becoming a cheese connoissuer, so the reviews will get better as I learn more about cheese.   

Making Love....and Cheese.

Ok, so here is the skinny: EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY FRIENDS HAS A BLOG!

Of course, I read them in hopes that if I ever started a blog, they would return the favor (ahem! hint). I get to read about their glamorous lives on the far off coasts of the United States while I am still stuck in the midwest. I started in Minnesota and am now attending Northland College in the northernmost part of Wisconsin - a way-to-small town called Ashland. Ever heard of it?

Nope, you haven't, trust me.

At least I have moved over a state, that's got to count for something...right? Anyway, still stuck with bulky clothes, mittens and hats almost year round, and worst of all SNOW. Snow that falls by the foot, and temperatures that freeze your contact solution even when it is inside your dorm room. 

However, there is something quirky and maybe not as fabulous as fashion week in Wisconsin. Do you know what it is?

CHEESE! 

Wisconsin is the cheese state and I get to live here for the next four years! How lucky am I?!

Fashion, seeing various celebrities on a daily basis, and living in big, glamorous cities...pfft! I don't need that, I have cheese!!!   

As mentioned in the title, this is a two part blog focusing on Love and Cheese. The 'Love' part of the blog is simply to celebrate the joy that people bring me in my every day life. For my first 'Love' post I would like to thank everyone who has read this post and will continue to read. I thank you for all of your support and I hope this blog can make your heart warm and fuzzy and also provide you with valuable information on Wisconsin's claim to dairy fame. 

Also, to keep this blog fresh and interesting I hope to have some posts in here from some of my friends who also love cheese. 

I hope you are excited as I am to learn about cheese! 

ttys, 

Sig.