Fall for Foodies

There are so many delicious possibilities when the leaves start to turn golden. See these companies� websites for the easy recipes.

Cream of Winter Squash Soup, uses Salute Sant�!�s Grapeseed Oil and Chili Grapeseed Oil (above).

Using La Tourangelle nut oils, you can make an assortment of tasty appetizers, such as Roasted Walnut Oil Bruschetta, using thinly sliced prosciutto, brie, and quartered pears drizzled with Walnut Oil (above left) and Roasted Almond Oil Hummus (above right).

The town of Santa Maria is famous for its barbecue, and Susie Q's Artisan Foods has packaged this up, so that you can enjoy it at home. Their signature Pinquito Beans, cooked with the spice package that is included, are tasty just like that. And you can also use the beans to make Fat-Free Bean Dip.

Broiled Pork Chops with Balsamic Peach Glaze are delicious for a fall dinner. Use Bellindora Vinegars' Peach Balsamic Vinegar.

Use Art of Chipotle's Smokey Red Sensation Chipotle Sauce, grilled vegetables and cheese to top a Vegetarian Goat Cheese Pizza.

Nothing is more pleasing on an autumn morning than the aroma of freshly baking muffins. Try some of the recipes on their website, using Giusto's Specialty Foods' (above) whole grain and organic flours.

Make a stunning Exotic Mushroom Pate using Trumpet Royale, Brown Clamshell, Forest Nameko, and or Velvet Pioppini (pictured above) mushrooms from Gourmet Mushrooms.

The homemade flavor of the chicken, beef and turkey broths from Savory Creations makes these delicious by themselves or as a tasty base for your own soup or sauce creations.

Sea scallops dusted with the girl & the fig�s Fennel Citrus House Blend and then seared (below) are a perfect pairing with a Rhone varietal wine, such as Viognier.

To truly savor McEvoy Ranch estate-grown and produced olive oil, a simple approach is best. Toast slices of country-style bread, rub with a cut clove of garlic, drizzle generously with the Traditional Blend Tuscan-style oil, made from selected Italian olive varieties. Sprinkle with salt, if desired.

What's new

Breakfast, lunch and dinner, and any snacks in between � delicious with these new companies on SavorCalifornia.com.

Marin French Cheese
Savory Creations
Taylor Brothers Farms dried plums (below)
Tuscan Heights Lavender Garden
Wolfsen's Meat and Sausage

Boo!

For discriminating trick-or-treaters (or their parents) --

L'Estaci Dolce�s Caramel Corn comes in two gourmet flavors: Sesame Almond and Maple Almond. Savor the sweet crunch!

Offer an assortment of cookies and candies in delightful � and tasty � Halloween shapes. Cookies from Little Laura's Sweets (above) and Halloween Select Mix from Marich Confectionery (below).

For chocolate lovers, Choclatique�s �What�s Up Doc� is carrot cake in a piece of chocolate (below).

Any harvest time celebration is special with a pumpkin cheesecake from Elegant Cheese Cakes (below).

Harvest Festival, Del Mar

Savor California returns to the Del Mar Harvest Festival at the Fairgrounds October 24 - 26. The following companies will be offering their gourmet products to taste and to purchase.

It's not too early to think about presents for the holidays!

21 Missions Organics (below)
Little Sky Lavender Farm
SnackMasters Jerky
Spindel Farms

Quotable

�A cheese is as worthy of preserving as a sixteenth-century building.�
-- Carlo Petrini
Founder
Slow Food International

�There are thousands of ways to change milk into cheese. That�s what makes it interesting.�
-- Sister Noella
The Cheese Nun

�Great milk comes from happy cows. Happy cows come from California. Make sure it�s made from real California milk.�
-- California Milk Advisory Board

Watch the famous �Happy Cows� television commercials on The California Milk Advisory Board.

Cheese in California, Part 1

Cheese has come a long way from its utilitarian roots as a way to preserve the nutrients in milk. Originally made in California by the Franciscan Fathers in the missions, cheese was first commercially produced in California in 1857 by Clarissa Steele in San Francisco. A few years later, a Monterey businessman marketed a uniquely California cheese that came to be known by his name: Monterey Jack.

Founded in 1865, Marin French Cheese has produced artisanal cheese in the same location in Petaluma, California since 1865, and is the oldest continually operating cheese factory in the United States. In the early 1900�s the company became the first in California to produce European styled soft-ripened cheese. Their World Cheese award winning Rouge et Noir Triple Cr�me Brie is pictured above.

Jennifer Bice raised champion goats as a young member of 4-H, and in 1978, she took over her family's dairy goat farm and expanded Redwood Hill Farm to make cheese and later yogurt. The farm continues to breed champions and garner awards nationally and internationally. Redwood Hill�s Gravenstein Gold (above) is a Gravenstein apple cider washed aged cheese.

When Mary Keehn started her goat herd in Arcata, a surplus of milk led her to experiment with cheese making. Now focused entirely on cheese and buying milk from local goat farms, Cypress Grove Chevre has expanded to include fresh, ripened, and firm cheeses. The signature Humboldt Fog is a creamy cheese with a ribbon of edible vegetable ash in the center and under the exterior surface (center, above).

At Bellwether Farms Cindy Callahan thought sheep were efficient grass-mowers, but sheep will have lambs, and a sheep milk dairy was the result. Now they make Italian inspired sheep milk cheese, sheep milk yogurt, as well as cheese made from milk from a neighbor�s Jersey cows. Pepato (sheep milk) and Carmody (cow milk) are shown above.

Sue Conley and Peggy Smith partnered to create Cowgirl Creamery in Tomales Bay Foods, a cheerful, converted hay barn. Made from local ingredients that capture the essence of West Marin, are cheeses such as Red Hawk (above), a triple-cream cheese, aged six weeks and washed with a brine solution that promotes the growth of a bacteria that tints the rind a sunset red-orange. Red Hawk won Best-In-Show at the American Cheese Society.

Bob Giacomini and his wife Dean began farming their Tomales Bay ranch in 1959 and their daughters grew up there. In 2000 the family founded Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese to produce their trademark Original Blue (above). �Farmstead� means that all of the milk that goes into the cheese comes from the farm�s own cows, and the cheese is made right on the farm. It is still the only classic-style blue cheese made in California.

Never enough cheese

The next "Savory News" will showcase these other California cheese producers:
Meyenberg Goat Milk
Mozzarella Fresca
Three Sisters Farmstead Cheese (below)