Legend has it that a shepherdess forgot her bread and cheese in these caves, and upon her return to collect her belongings she discovered the cheese covered in mold.  It was delicious and voila! Bleu cheese was born! Bleu cheese has been considered the King of Cheeses since the Age of Enlightenment (18th century); its good taste has been mentioned since the days of Pliny the Elder in 50 AD.  Roquefort cheese is made from ewe’s milk; it gets its unique blue-green appearance and sharp bold flavor from Penicillium roqueforti.  P. roqueforti “can be found from soil, decaying organic substances and plant parts.”  It requires a precise temperature and moist conditions, which is why Bleu Cheese is grown in the damp caves of Roquefort.  In cheese making, milk is made into curds, pressed and drained, and then ripened.  P. roqueforti is applied before the pressing process.  During the pressing, needles are inserted into the cheese at the dairy plant and then transferred to the caves of Roquefort in France.  The needles create small holes for the mold to grow asexual spores and spread; it acts by “break[ing] down complex organic molecules into simpler ones, [and] smoothing out the fibrous structure of the cheese.”  To bear the name Roquefort Bleu Cheese, it must be made in the Roquefort caves; this location and name has been legally protected since 1411.

--L. Botts