----- Original Message -----
From: "Olivers" >
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 12:29 PM
Subject: what is hook cheese ???

> > [snip]
> >
> > Well, I've lurked here a while and this is my first post. Around here
> > (central North Carolina, USA) hoop cheese is what a lot of older
> > people call medium to sharp cheddar cheese. There used to be a little
> > country store nearby where my grandparents would stop and buy 'hoop
> > cheese' and the clerks would cut a wedge off a big wax-covered wheel
> > (possible source of the 'hoop' part of the name) of cheddar. When I
> > was a kid it was always sharper than I liked...
> >
> > So in regard to the original poster's question, it might help if we
> > knew who the host of the show was and what the provenance of the
> > recipe was. There's that older lady from South Carolina who has a
> > show... if it was her, she may well have meant cheddar cheese.
> > Especially as the OP said it was a mac'n'cheese recipe, I'd bet on the
> > cheddar. Just my $0.02, and now I'll re-lurk...
> >
> Other US perspective....
>
> No way, Jose!
>
> "Cheddar" is a name of late origin given to sort of standard classic
yellow
> regular cheese in the US. It ain't cheddar or much like (except in some
> aged, small batch varieties) what transpondians think of as cheddar.
> better we should use names like the humble "Rat trap" or "Longhorn"
> (signifying long logs instead of fat wheels) as more descriptive and apt.
>
> In my experience, "hoop" or "Farmer" cheese was the basic "curds minus
> whey" product, partially/mostly strained and receiving it's name from
> having been packed into a wooden of metal "hoop" (ring) from which aging
> might turn into cheese for slicing or grating and other culinary purpose.
>
> Cottage cheese and ricotta may have similar flavors but have either not
> been dehydrated to the extent that hoop cheese is (or have had milk solids
> and liquid added back, as i suspect storbought cottage cheese does).
>
> TMO

Olivers, are you saying "No way Jose" that no one in the SE United States
uses hoop cheese = yellow cheese? If so, I'll have to disagree with you,
since I've been hearing people call it that for 28 years. However, if
you're saying "that's not the common use of the term, this is," then I'll
happily agree. But what I was saying is that if the host on Food Network
is from this neck of the woods (and one, Paula Deen, is) and especially as
the recipe mentioned was a macaroni and cheese recipe, it seems like the
colloquial use of hoop cheese = yellow cheese (and I also agree that what we
call cheddar would be called cheddar elsewhere) may indeed be what was meant
for this recipe.

However, it's all a little pointless, since the original poster hasn't got
back to anyone so far with who the host was, more details about the recipe
in question, etc. Again, if you were going to make me guess, the 'yellow
cheese' meaning seems to fit most macaroni and cheese styles I know of,
while I haven't had a mac n cheese that would include anything like the
'Farmer's cheese' hoop cheese. A lasagna or something along those lines
might be a better fit for the curds and whey meaning of the term, but as
always, your milage may vary, and actually if anyone has a mac n cheese
recipe that uses that type of cheese I'd love to have it - I sort of collect
mac n cheese recipes, although I mostly use my mom's old recipe.

Anyway, $0.02 more from my corner. BTW, Olivers, what part of the US are
you from? Around here hoop pretty much means yellow, and what you (and lots
of other people) call hoop cheese we call Farmer's cheese. Just curious,
I'm starting to wonder about the geographic distribution of this
terminology...

Thanks,
Ken Coble