By Christina LeadlayPublished in Embassy Magazine (www.embassymag.ca), October 25th, 2006

The first-ever guide to independent cheesemakers across the country is a mouth-watering journey, but don’t try to scratch and sniff the cover.

Gurth Pretty uses similar vocabulary to describe cheese as sommeliers use when discussing fine wine. "Each cheese from each country is different because of what the animals are grazing on–it’s the terroir, the weather, the growing conditions, the animal well-being and all the other factors that make each cheese different and unique," he says passionately early one morning - and he’s just finished breakfast. "So how can you compare a Stilton to a Roquefort to a Blue Benedictine from Saint-Benoit-du-Lac in Quebec?"

There is no comparison, argues Mr. Pretty, who says Canadian cheeses are just as good as their Old World cousins. And he should know. Mr. Pretty, who styles himself as Canada’s food and beverage ambassador, has just published The Definitive Guide to Canadian Artisanal and Fine Cheese, the first guide to all the different cheese produced across the country.

Mr. Pretty says he began appreciating cheese as a child growing up in Montreal, and grew more interested in the industry while he was teaching a Canadian cuisine course at Toronto’s George Brown college in the late 1990s, a course he created himself based on his obsession with Canadian regional foods.

"I’m just passionate about the different food and beverages we have in our country," says Mr. Pretty by phone from Toronto, citing everything from mustard to Saskatoon berries, Arctic char fish, butter tarts, Red River cereal and smoked meat as uniquely Canadian foods. "We just have so many wonderful products that, unfortunately, we don’t toot our own horn enough, and that’s why I am."

Over 120 Independent Cheesemakers

A former private chef for a Canadian diplomat in Ireland, Mr. Pretty says he was inspired to make The Definitive Guide to Canadian Artisanal and Fine Cheese after he came across a similar book in French all about cheese from Quebec and wondered if there was an equivalent publication in English for the rest of the country. "I went to bookstores and cracked open any book they had on cheese. Most books were international in scope, and we’d be lucky if there was one page about Canadian cheese," he says.

The soft-cover guide is crammed with full-colour photographs and detailed information on over 120 independent cheesemakers from Nova Scotia to British Columbia. Each entry contains contact information, a list of cheeses produced, a description of the business history and the people and animals behind the operation (what breed of cow, goat or sheep), as well as tourist information about the local area. Thirty recipes using cheese are tucked away in the final section.

"The secondary goal of the book is for people to read it cover to cover and be tempted to go to certain parts of the country for their summer vacation," says Mr. Pretty, whose biggest challenge in making this book was not getting to taste every cheese. "As I was not sponsored and did not receive any funding from any organization, I was not able to go visit everyone," he says, disappointedly. There is no central source of information about Canada’s cheesemakers - each business or farm is provincially licensed - so Mr. Pretty hopes this book will be a useful tool for the cheesemaking community, as well as consumers, chefs, cheesemongers, food writers and even government officials to promote culinary tourism in Canada. Agriculture Canada regularly calls on Mr. Pretty to work with them at various international food trade shows.

Educating Consumers

Historically, Canadian cheese had a great reputation, says Mr. Pretty. "Britons survived off our cheddar until the 1950s. We exported more cheese to the UK than they produced themselves," he says. In fact, Canadian cheeses continue to win awards at international cheese competitions. However, it’s consumers in Canada who misunderstand what good Canadian cheese is.

"We have become lazy. We just go to the large grocery stores and buy whatever they’ve got there, which at times may not be the highest quality cheese, it’s more mass produced," says Mr. Pretty, who is encouraged by the renewed interest in specialty food shops and the renaissance of the Canadian cheese industry. Though The Definitive Guide to Canadian Artisanal and Fine Cheese is hot off the presses, he’s already working on a second edition. "Since I stopped my research and my writing last July, I’ve discovered 31 other cheesemakers," says Mr. Pretty with a note of excitement in his voice. And he’s already started working on another book tentatively titled The All Canadian Cheese Cookbook, featuring recipes using cheese from every company in the first book, and matched with a local wine, beer, cider or whisky.

And just as wine lovers carry pocket wine guides, Mr. Pretty is convinced cheese lovers will bring his book with them to the cheesemonger’s. "I don’t provide tasting notes because we all have different tastebuds," he says. "I give a description of the cheese, but I want you to go and try it, so that you can write right in the book: ‘It has a bit of a mushroomy flavour, really creamy, Oh yeah! Order again.’"

christina@embassymag.ca

The Definitive Guide to Canadian Artisanal and Fine Cheese
By Gurth Pretty
Whitecap
352pp. $29.95