I went to the market for vegetables and stopped at the Pacheco Family Ranch table because of the banner: cows on a green hill, Est. 1955, family owned and operated, Petaluma, California. Behind the table was a young guy with butter in one hand and cheese in the other. I left with both.
The butter is lightly cultured
Cultured means the cream is fermented a little before it's churned, which most store butter skips. This one is lightly cultured. Next to the store version it was different in two ways I noticed right away: the consistency and the taste. Both were better.
I'm not going to pretend butter is a thrill. But this one is the reason I'd go back to that table.
The cheese is the one you don't refrigerate
The cheese is aged six months. The guy at the table told me it keeps without a fridge, which tells you how far it is from the soft, wrapped stuff in the dairy case. I didn't write down its name, and I regret that. If you go, ask for the one aged six months.
He was also the one who told me what I know about the cheese. The banner says family owned and operated, and the table looks the part: a cooler, boxes, a knife on a board and one person who can tell you about everything on it. That's the real difference from a refrigerated shelf.
How I'd eat them
Butter first, on plain bread, with nothing on top. That's the fair test, and it's where a difference in texture shows up fastest. Take it out of the fridge a little early so it spreads instead of tearing the bread. If you bought more than you'll finish this week, it freezes well.
For the cheese, slice it thin and let the slices sit for twenty minutes. Aged cheese tastes more like itself at room temperature than straight from the cold. Put it next to something sweet, like a pear or a spoon of honey, and it won't need anything else.
Questions worth asking at the table
Which cheese is the one aged six months, and what's it called? When was the butter made? What do the cows eat? I'd also ask how long each one keeps and how they'd store it. The answer for the cheese was so different from what I'm used to that I'd like to hear the rule for the butter too.
The butter is the reason to go back. The cheese is the reason to bring a knife.
The rest of what I carried home is in What I Carried Home.