Review: Old Amsterdam Cheese

Note: I was sent a sample of this cheese to try, but was under no obligation to review it or even to like it!

I seldom buy Dutch cheese. I put this down to overdosing on it in my student days. Edam was cheap and easily available, and both Edam and Gouda had a reputation for being very low in calories - the Slimming magazines we devoured were full of recipes and meal suggestions that used them.

But as my taste in cheese has, like a good cheese, matured, I've lost interest in the rather bland flavour and slightly rubbery texture of those old friends. So I was very pleasantly surprised when I cut a piece of Old Amsterdam and flexed it, to see if that rubberiness was there -and it SNAPPED! Not a hint of rubberiness, it is a proper mature cheese texture with that firmer texture that gives it a much more satisfying mouth feel.

The taste, too, was anything but bland. It has a lovely strong, nutty flavour that marks it out in my book as a Serious Cheese. Just one thing about it puzzles me. The blurb on the pack says "it has ripening crystals that guarantee its constant quality". What the heck is a ripening crystal?

Ripening crystals or not, I'll definitely be buying it again!