Amsterdam Gouda Cheese Tasting
At last Amsterdam has a new Gouda cheese tasting worth recommending. Since the Reypenaer tastings closed – they sadly didn’t survive COVID – I’ve had nothing to suggest for visitors wanting a proper city-centre cheese experience. That has now changed.
Amsterdam Cheese Company has started running tastings, and I’m genuinely delighted. Yes, this is a tourist-facing shop in a tourist part of town, and the cheese is packaged for travel and the prices reflect the prime location of the shops. But here’s the thing: the cheese itself is the real deal. It’s made by a collective of around 400 Dutch farmers north of Amsterdam, in an area with excellent soil and a strong cheesemaking tradition – this is cheese that Dutch people eat. I’ve visited one of these farms hundreds of times on my Amsterdam Windmill Tour and can speak firsthand to the high standards of animal welfare and production that is their philosophy. There are a couple of other cheese tastings available in central Amsterdam, and while I won’t knock them, the cheese there is produced with tourists in mind. Here, it isn’t. So when a company rooted in that quality starts offering tastings, it fills a real gap in what Amsterdam has to offer.
On to the tasting itself. These take place at the company’s central branch on the Kalverstraat, just a short walk from the pretty square called Spui. The shop has been well refitted to include a dedicated tasting area behind a glass wall – connected to the shop, but shielded from its noise and bustle. We sat at a horseshoe-shaped bar, with a few smaller tables dotted around the space. The maximum group size is 12, we were just two, which I hope changes as word gets out.
We were welcomed by Andrea, who was warm, engaging and knowledgeable without being intense about it. She gave us a brief overview of the cheese and its origins, after which we watched a short video that filled in more of the story. Then the tasting began.
Plates arrived with six pieces of cheese – one per variety – and a palate-cleansing biscuit alongside each. We were offered water or soft drinks, we chose water, which is the best neutral companion for tasting. Andrea guided us through from mildest to most aged, and we made notes and gave each cheese a personal rating on a form provided. All of that is solid and enjoyable — but if it had stopped there, I might have been mildly underwhelmed.
What elevated the tasting was an unexpected and genuinely fun element. After tasting each cheese individually, Andrea presented us with a list of accompaniments and challenged us to guess which two she would pair with the cheese we’d just tried. No spoilers here, but the full list of items was: apple syrup, black garlic honey, carrot, dark chocolate, dill mustard, dried cranberries, grapes, herby dip, pear, pickle, sea salt, and stroopwafel. That’s quite an unusual list of flavours to combine with Gouda cheese! The combinations were surprising, the guessing game was great fun, and at least one pairing was spectacular and Andrea’s enthusiasm shone.
So which ones did I like the best… The Maxima Aged is a long-time personal favourite, it recently voted the best cheese in the world at the Wisconsin World Champion Cheese Contest and it really is a superb cheese. Clearly I’m not the only one who thinks so. I also loved the 12 month goats cheese. Even if you don’t usually like traditional soft goats cheeses, in Gouda style is is completely different, creamier when young, tangier when older. The 36 month cow’s milk Gouda is an onother winner for me, explosions of flavour and zingy crystals – yummy!
After the tasting, you receive a (dare I say it) cheesy postcard to send or keep, along with a 10% discount voucher redeemable in-store or online. Tickets are booked on their Dutch Gouda Cheese Tasting page and cost just under €30 per person. The tasting takes 45 minutes.