Formatgerie La Seu

Friday dawned grey and chilly, and my intention was to head to the gym after dropping the kids off at school.  But by then the sun had begun to burn off the grey, and my car turned up the hill instead of down.  I went for a fabulous walk on the Carretera de les Aigues.  It had been weeks since I’d been there, and it felt good.

After a few hours in the office, I met Lois for a late lunch at Formatgeria La Seu, the most fabulous cheese shop in Barcelona.  It is on a TINY sliver of a street in the Barri Gotic.  The shop inhabits a spot that was a butter making factory long ago, and it has much of the original equipment.  Katherine McLaughlin, a Scot who started the business 11 years ago, features only a small number of Spanish farmhouse cheeses.  They change depending on what she can get from her sources.  According to Katherine, cheesemakers are not the most reliable folks.  “I’ll order 20 cheeses from this bloke and I’ll get 4!” she told us.  “It’s bloody impossible to predict what I’ll have from one day to the next.”

I know from past experience that Katharine can seem a bit prickly, but she is a lovely person who is absolutely passionate about cheese.  She closes the shop for six weeks every summer to work with cheesemakers.  There is a small space in the back of the shop where she has two high tables with stools.  She had just finished serving a larger group when we got there, and she seemed glad to have the place quiet down.  “I don’t like groups,” she told us.  “I’ve been avoiding that one that just left here for five years.  But they gave me six dates they could come and, hell, I was trapped.”

There is no real menu to speak of, just olives, cheese, wine and, for dessert, cheese ice cream.  We ordered a tasting plate of six cheeses that came with membrillo and some jam, and bread.  All were perfectly aged and just the right temperature.  Katherine had left the wine bottles that our glasses had come from on our table, and my mom and I spent two hours eating, drinking and chatting with Katherine.  I couldn’t resist bringing home a few—El Cuirol—a lovely Catalunya goat cheese with a mild flavor and texture that is dense, and somewhere between creamy and crumbly; Las Gormills—an unbelievably buttery cow cheese from Cantabria; and Queso de la Serena, a somewhat strong cheese from Extremadura. Queso de la Serena is reminiscent of Torta del Casar—it’s so gooey that you just slice the top off and scoop out the cheese with your bread or a knife.  But I like the Serena much better—the flavor is more subtle and complex; it doesn’t wallop you over the head the way Torta del Casar does.

Although I’ve been to La Seu many times, I learned on Friday that Katherine had opened a wine bar—Bar Zim—two doors down with her sister and her business partner.  The bar was not open for the evening yet, but Katharine gave us a peek of the space.  It’s miniscule, consisting of a few stools and a counter, and about 15 varieties of Spanish wine.  Now that it’s on my radar, I’ll have to figure out when I can get there.

We all hugged, and Lois and I headed out into the early evening happy and warm from the wine, and full of good cheese.