Cedar Rapids cheese expert earns rare certification

CEDAR RAPIDS — Nursery rhymes instill familiarity with a variety of trades — the butcher, the baker or the candlestick maker, for example. Perhaps you’ve been asked whether you know “the muffin man.”

But are you familiar with your local cheesemonger?

If you’ve been to the cheese counter at the Oakland Road Hy-Vee in Cedar Rapids, chances are high you’ve seen Chris Luken or his work. The Certified Cheese Professional with the American Cheese Society recently earned a more prestigious title: Certified Cheese Sensory Evaluator.

With more than 20 years experience in artisan cheese, he’s one of only 78 in the country to hold both titles. But despite his rare expertise, Luken’s mission is to make the cream of the crop accessible to every grocery shopper, from cheddar to Camembert.

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How he made the cut

After a family-owned sporting goods store in Madison, Wisconsin, closed, Luken found a new kind of job at a gourmet grocery store around 2003, where he would call cheesemakers across America’s dairy land in the days when dial-up made internet research slow.

“When I went there, I couldn’t tell Muenster from cheddar,” he said. “I (would call and ask) ‘I got a cheese called Dirty Laundry, what’s in it?’ ”

After thousands of hours behind the counter, thousands of pounds of cutting cheese with a wire and months of studying over the last two decades, Luken sees blocks of cheese in dimensions beyond flavor.

His certification as a Cheese Professional, held by about 15 other Hy-Vee professionals across the Midwest and 1,000 others across America, tested him on a wide swathe of knowledge from cheese handling and safety to butter fat content and breeds of dairy-producing animals.

His recent exam to become a Certified Cheese Sensory Evaluator tested him through samples of adulterated milk and cheese by asking him to determine the presence of garlic, buttermilk, grass, asparagus and dozens of other attributes.

But terroir — a French term for a “taste of place” caused by environmental factors like feed, soil and air quality around the animals that help produce cheese — is what helps him pinpoint with accuracy the cheese maker, type or location of a wide range of unpasteurized varieties, just by tasting it.

“Flavor is taste plus aroma,” he teaches cheese consumers. “I have to train my brain to ask what the flavor is.”

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Let them eat cheese

Like wine, high-end beer and other specialized foods, fancy cheese can be intimidating. With a cheesy but sincere smile, Luken makes his lactose-laden knowledge digestible. Through one small interaction at a time, even customers on a budget can appreciate more artisan offerings.

“They might be holding (cheese) in their hand, and I’ll say ‘Hey, would you like to try that?’ ” Luken said.

Sometimes, he introduces new faces to defining moments with Esquirrou, a selection from the Pays Basque region in the south of France that made him want to do this for a living 19 years ago.

Other times, he perks up to help customers with a question — even if it’s not in his department.

“I’m not sure how to pronounce it,” a customer once asked him as she squinted at her shopping list.

“I walked her over to the produce department,” Luken recounted. “It was Swiss chard.”

The local expert doesn’t look down at customers with Velveeta or slices of American in their cart. He sees no need for $30 cheese to top your tacos. But for those intrigued about cheeses that will enrich the palate, he’s found a few ways to lure them in to a whole new world.

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In most cases, he’s happy to open up a cheese package to give a sample. He’s created a section of “trial size” cheeses in small packages that help customers overcome hesitation about cost or waste to try new options.

But even when he’s not on the clock, personable quips on his stickers and labels work overtime to convey knowledge through fun facts and tips to make the most of whatever cheese is on display.

“Putting it out in a (display) dome, you don’t get to communicate,” Luken said. “It’s cold.”

Whether it’s Colby Jack or Chaubier, he’s found that giving customers confidence is key. Before long, their vocabulary expands from entry-level sensations like creamy and sharp to flavorful identifiers like buttery or earthy.

How to be a better cheese head

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Much like wine tasting, a big part of learning to appreciate the finer things in life is done through your sense of smell.

Flavors like saltiness, acidity, sweetness and bitterness are picked up by your tongue. But when you detect hints of cherry, hazelnut or other attributes in cheese, it’s usually thanks to the olfactory bulb's connection to your throat as your brain tries to associate a tiny part of your tasting sample with a memory where you smelled it.

An easy starting point for beginners wanting to broaden their horizons is identifying whether a cheese is natural or processed, such as individually wrapped slices that have a “plastic” taste.

Some also can pick up the true meaning of cave aged cheese to differentiate the dank, musty taste of a cave cheese from another cheese aged in a room with artificial humidity and temperature controls.

A trickier thing to identify is whether a cheese is naturally smoked or chemically smoked. With lots of practice, cheese tasters can identify the type of wood used and even the types of enzymes used to produce the cheese.

Most cheese in the United States is pasteurized, making exact identification of certain factors more difficult. Many cheeses are inoculated with bacteria after pasteurization that contributes to its identity — it’s what makes Parmesan taste like Parmesan, or what makes Gouda taste like Gouda.

The temperature of cheese also makes a difference in how it’s perceived. Luken advises customers to let cheese sit in their mouth for a bit before chewing slowly. Coating the mouth with a cheese can make a good pairing with wine, beer or food stand out even more.

In many ways, a cheese is a cheese — cheddar tastes like cheddar and Havarti tastes like Havarti, he said. Identifying profiles can add up to another world of knowledge, one bite at a time.

For Luken, passing that on to others is a joy he loves almost as much as the cheese.

Comments: Features reporter Elijah Decious can be reached at (319) 398-8340 or elijah.decious@thegazette.com.