Hotels and ques: the romance has begun
Hotels have developed a beautiful love story with wine . Once consolidated, the next step could be to try to seduce the cheese and with the cheese . Well no. It is not easy to find, not even in cheese cultures such as the French, Swiss, Italian or Spanish, a hotel that has cheese as an ally. It is, it must be said, a risky alliance because cheese is like breaking bad , you love it or you can't stand it. In addition, it has associated, let's say, aromatic values, which are not precisely those of roses and orange blossom. But if you love him Being in a hotel that pays homage to this mass of milk is a pleasure. And here, we talk about pleasures.
In Spain there are few style exercises cheese hotel. There are traditional cheese factories with adjoining hotels, such as the Redes cheese factory, in Asturias, which makes Casín cheese. It is part of it Agrotourism Reciegos , quite charming. It is indeed, Asturias, the area that links more naturally, cheese and accommodation but always in the form of small rural hotels that arise from a cheese factory. You have to travel south to Salamanca, to find a proposal that stands out.
cheese room
Is named Hacienda Zorita ; It is a curious place with a discreet profile, continuous crowds and powerful ambitions. Hacienda Zorita is a hotel that is the Arribes del Duero Natural Park, in the Duero Valley. Until then, all normal. It is in a hospitable house and a Dominican hacienda from 1366. That is not so normal anymore. But this hotel (beautiful, pampered) is part of an entire ecosystem; is the Zorita ecosystem that encompasses: production of wines, balsamic vinegar, Iberian acorn-fed meats, virgin olive oil and yes, cheeses with raw sheep's milk.
Specifically four own cheeses; they are: cheese meadow reserve (cure 9 months) , organic cheese (cured 6 months in Shiraz wine) , real goat cheese (cuation 6 months to the thyme) and the meadow cake ; this last cheese the SuperGold 2013 Gold Award; that is to say, an award for the best cake-type cheese in the world. This is already much less normal. Nor is it that in the center of the room there is a tasting of wines, oil and, yes, cheeses in a cellar that keeps 1366 barrels. No. It is not normal.
Hotelophiles meet Cheesephiles
all products of Zorita´s Kitchen , which is the name of the product line manufactured by the The Haciendas group respond to the philosophy of slow food ; Among other rules, this movement protects traditional crops and the conservation of local gastronomic traditions. Besides, everything here is slow: curing the cheeses takes time and nobody speeds up the processes. Things are when they have to be. Doesn't look bad motto.
Around Hacienda Zorita we find an organic farm , where we see the churra sheep whose milk makes the cheese; also (although we hardly see it because it is camouflaged in the environment) a cheese factory with contemporary architecture. Cheesemakers, you are/we are in luck because you can visit, There is also included a blind cheese tasting A cheese delirium for cheese addicts. No, all this is still not normal.
The den of pleasures
In Zorita you can see and smell a cheese cellar. Cheese cellars are the new wine cellars; an amenitie to which some hotels are resorting to give value to the cheeses they serve and, incidentally, improve the perception of themselves. We can see them in hotels like the Ritz Carlton in Toronto or the Park Hyatt in Chicago; how curious, none of them is a cheese culture. Perhaps that is why they find it more exotic and/or impressive to provide the hotel with this type of space. Why can't we find cavas like this in Spain, where there are more than 200 different types of cheese? Here is a mystery to solve.
The cheese reception
It is also difficult to find here uses of cheese that we do see in other cultures that are not so cheese-producing. For example: we arrive at the hotel reception and someone offers us a wine and a pressed milk paste that looks like…cheese. Namely, They offer us wine and cheese while they prepare our room. Here the cheese appears as an element of empathy and sophistication. This, so easy, is what some New York hotels like The Library or the Casablanca do. In this city, the cheese culture is experiencing a sweet moment thanks to small and artisanal producers.
The hotel-cheese affair is still in its infancy. They are getting to know each other and seeing what they can bring to each other. Cheese lovers and hotel lovers have it clear: that romance has a future.
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A cheese and wine reception in New York