Mimolette Cheese

As long as I am talking about cheese, I thought I should write about Mimolette, which I tried for the first time last week. I had seen this cheese from time to time at Whole Foods, but I was not attracted by its similarity to a cantalope, with a hard, pockmarked rind and a bright orange center. I should have tried it earlier.

This French cow's milk cheese is sometimes called Boule de Lille after the city of its birth in French Flanders, and it was purportedly a favorite of Charles De Gaulle. It is relatively sharp and very firm, not too creamy except at the very center. Almost everyone notes its relationship to Edam, but it is aged for six to nine months, unlike most Edam sold in the United States.