This past weekend, I went down to Cincinnati to visit some friends. It also happened to be St. Patrick’s day, but that was really just a coincidence. So Saturday, we got into the typical Irish Shenanigans, Guinness all day, broken up with some delicious Gomez Turtles for some Mexican flair. Then Sunday, after a delicious breakfast at Tucker’s we made our way to East Walnut Hills’ newest attrpaction: Urban Stead Cheese. Ben and I have been fangirling over Urban Stead’s Instagram since it was announced they would be opening near his house in Walnut Hills, so this was a dream come true.
We lucked out visiting the day after St. Patrick’s day because I think all of Cincinnati was hungover and asleep, so we got Andrea, the co-owner, all to ourselves. Andrea and her husband Scott both grew up in dairy farming families and always knew they’d like to incorporate dairy and cheese culture into their lives and careers. They started renovating their building about a year ago and were able to salvage pipes and equipment from a closed prison dairy farm. The pipes are used throughout their building, both in the cheese production area and also in the tasting room as table legs and the bar footrail.
They have huge windows looking into their production room which allows people in the tasting room to watch the process while keeping everything back there sterile. Scott was in the process of sterilizing some of their containers when we arrived and we learned that they clean and sterilize all of their equipment after they finish with a cheese making cycle and again before they begin. Hella clean.
Their cheese aging rooms were the star of the show for me, apart from the actual cheese which was obviously the true star. They have three aging rooms, two of which you can see from the tasting room. Each room is temperature and dew point controlled, but since they only started cheese production in February and the rooms aren’t very full, they add a bit of warm water on the floor to help keep the room at the set dew point. The cheddar will age for another 8–9 months, and the gouda needs another couple weeks. The camembert we had on our charcuterie board needs to age for about 19 days and is aged in the secret back room we couldn’t see. The Urban Stead cheese is aged on poplar boards that they build themselves, although apparently, the ultimate dream type of wood to age cheese on is spruce. I can’t wait to come back in a few months and see the rooms start to fill up! If heaven is a place I’m pretty sure it is a never-ending cheese aging room with our Lord and Savior Beyoncé singing to us while we taste it all. Speaking of, who else is going to OTR II!? Hannah and I will be at the Cleveland show!
Our server recommended that we order the cheese curds and a charcuterie board and we naturally added a bottle of Bordeaux for the group.
The charcuterie board came with house-pickled onions and green beans which were AMAZING. I’ll be pickling green beans very soon because of this. It also had, prosciutto, salami, grainy mustard, Urban Stead Camembert, Urban Stead Quark with honey and blueberries, fig jam, and a bonus Irish Cheddar not made by Urban Stead but just a bonus addition for St. Pattys.
Cheddar Cheese Curds
These were surprisingly delicious! The only cheese curds I have had before have been the deep fried variety and the texture was always a little off-putting. These were just like mini pieces of cheddar and tasted a little like mozzarella.
Quark
Quark is a German cream cheese-like cheese and when I used to get it in Germany the consistency was closer to a thick yogurt or sour cream. The Urban Stead Quark is thicker and a little crumblier and was excellent on a cracker with some fig jam.
Camembert
Andrea told us that the Camembert would continue to get creamier with a little more time, but it was still good when we tried it!
Since we were obviously dedicated cheese fans, Andrea brought out some Young Gouda. They took a wheel of gouda out of the aging room to see how it was doing and though it needs a few more weeks, she said it was showing very well now. Young Gouda is also an excellent rap name we came up with while bopping about Belgium and the Netherlands.
If you’re in Cincinnati, you should definitely check out Urban Stead cheese! Get updates on their Instagram here.
Here’s the details:
Address
3036 Woodburn Ave
Cincinnati, OH 45206
Hours
Tue -Fri: 2-9 pm
Sat: 12-9 pm
Sun: 12-6 pm
(Closed Monday)
Bonus, how cute is their logo cow?
P.S. Most of the photos are courtesy of friend-of-the-blog and quality photographer, Ben Ko. You can follow his photography on Instagram.
