There are four types of MILK used for cheese: goat, cow, sheep, and buffalo. The milk from each animal ranges in flavor and fat content. Goat milk has the lowest fat content with a light tangy flavor, cow milk with the next highest and a mild creamy flavor, and sheep and buffalo having the highest fat content with a rich buttery flavor.
Consider the milk for a cheese like a grape varietal for a wine. The milk is going to produce a cheese. But depending on the recipe, each cheese is going to be different. You can have one Chardonnay grape but depending on where it’s grown, how it’s aged, what ingredients are used… the final product is going to vary from one producer to the next.
We can break cheeses down into four TEXTURE categories:
Soft – these are going to range from scoopable & runny to spongy & fudgy
Semi-soft & Semi-firm– these will be springy & sliceable, will usually be creamy on the palate
Firm – these will be sliceable & grateable, but also crumbly and even dry and flakey
There might be some exceptions in these textures, but overall, this will be it.
And then we have the STYLES of cheese:
Fresh– these cheeses are minimally aged, soft in texture, they have no rind, are white in color, and mild in flavor: Chevre, Ricotta, Cream Cheese
Bloomy Rind– these are the ones with the white rind, soft to semi-firm in texture, butter and creamy in flavor (for the most part): Camembert, Brie, and Mt. Tam
Washed Rind– these are your “funky” cheeses. Soft to firm in texture, they are usually rubbed or soaked in a brine, beer, or even wine with a pink to orange rind. They actually range from mild and buttery to robust and salty/meaty in flavor but even the mild ones will be the next step up from a bloomy rind cheese: Taleggio (tah-le gio,) Oma, and Epoisses (eh-pwah-ss.)
Blue – Blue cheese is injected with Pencillum roqueforti mold that creates those blue veins they are famous for. Mostly robust in flavor, the color of the mold might range from green to dark blue-black: Stilton, Gorgonzola, Oregon Blue
There are other types and styles of cheese that we can dive into later, but for the sake of simplicity, this is it.
So! If you like super buttery, creamy cheeses, the white rinded bloomy rind cheeses will be cheese for you. And it would be good to adventure into the more robust washed rinds and experience their flavors as well. Or if you like firm, nutty cheddars, you could try different hard cheeses out like Gouda, Gruyere, or Manchego.
Understand that there is much more to cheese but these are the basics.
