Grocery Shopping with a Twist

Arts Explorer #7: Smile, Say Cheese!

“Say cheese”...the most famous of all sayings when taking a picture. Why not carry into our daily experiences at the grocery store, at a restaurant, when cooking at home?

Enjoying a cup of Parmesan Cheese
at a catering event in Albion Hills

      Cheese is one of those staples in my vocabulary and fridge. If someone asked me my favourite food, I’d say cheese! I am one of those people who will put cheese on everything and eat cheese any which way it is served. Though, sadly I have been diagnosed as lactose intolerant since I was five years old. But, I don’t let that get in the way of the many delicious cheeses out in the world for me to eat! When I read the outline for this task, without hesitation I knew I wanted to share with my classmates many interesting facts about the common dairy product called cheese. I work at a local grocery store in Mississauga, and we carry many different types of cheeses. In addition, I also work for a catering company, where we serve gourmet cheeses as an appetizer but also use cheese in many of the dishes made. Throughout my experiences working with and tasting different types of cheeses, I believe I have become a cheese connoisseur, if you will. Cheese comes in a variety of shapes, sizes and colours. The chart below will outline a variety of my favourite cheeses, the different shapes cheese comes in, the texture cheeses may have and also a list of the various colours cheese posses. Furthermore, the chart will list a variety of foods you can make using cheese!

Cheeses A to Z (My Favourites)	Textures I feel:	Shapes I see:	Colours I see:	Entertaining 101: What to do with Cheese?!
Asiago	Soft	Round Wheel	White	Cheese and Bacon triangles
Blue	Semi-Soft	Rectangular	Orange	Blue Cheese Onion Focaccia
Bocconcini	Semi-Hard	Triangular	Marble (Orange and white)	Tomato and Bocconcini Salad
Brie	Hard	Cylindrical	Yellow	Baked Brie with Strawberry Glaze
Camembert		Square	Cream	Big bowl Cheese dip
Cheddar (mild, medium, old)				Apple-Cider Cheddar Fondue
Colby				Cream of Broccoli and Cheddar Soup
Cottage Cheese				Cheesecake
Cream Cheese				Cream cheese icing for various baked goods
Curds				Poutine
Feta (Greek, Canadian, Macedonian)				Salad topping
Fruilano				Cheese and Pear Crepes
Goat				Cheese Bread
Gouda				Gouda Broccoli Salad
Gruyere				Soft Cheesy Pretzels
Havarti				Baked Havarti Egg
Mascarpone				Amaretto and Mascarpone Fondue
Monterey Jack				Grilled Cheese
Mozzarella				Pizza
Muenster				Cheese Tray
Nacho Cheese (cheese Whiz)				Nachos
Oka				Cheese Sticks
Parmesan				Parmesan Vegetable Toss
Provolone				Cheese Quesadilla
Ricotta				Lasagne
Romano				Cheese Enchiladas
Swiss				Cheese and Steak Sandwich

What cheese are you?! Check out this site and fill out the online quiz to find out what your cheese profile is! http://www.ilovecheese.com/cheese_profiler.asp


My cheese sketches. 3 of my favourite cheeses:

From the top: Goat cheese, Asiago Cheese, Swiss Cheese

Shape:

Various cheese trays from a catering event
at the RBC bank, Toronto

When we are grocery shopping, we are often found on auto-pilot. This means we don’t take the time to notice distinguishing characteristics of our most favourite foods. Cheese, a common dairy product, comes in a variety of shapes. According to Schirrmacher & Fox (2009), shape is defined by contrasting colour and textures in a given area (p. 140).  Similarly to humans possessing their own qualities and personalities, so does the shape of an object. No two cheeses are exactly alike! Cheese can be viewed as a circle, square, rectangle, triangle, or even a cylinder. Each cheese has its own height and weight which helps define the cheese as being its own unique entity.    

As a future educator, it’s important to understand that shapes are all around us, not just the geometrical ones used when studying math. Investigating shapes in our daily lives can be a fun activity done in our classrooms today. For example, during snack or lunch time, the children can take out their food and the class can compare the shapes of the different foods. The educator can prompt the discussion by asking open ended questions such as “who has the biggest fruit?” or “what is the smallest food on the table?” or if the children are at a higher level of thinking, the educator could ask a question where children are comparing two dimensions, such as “how many foods are opaque and symmetrical?” Another activity focused on shapes can be explored by sketching out the different shapes seen in each child’s lunch. I feel that sketching out my favourite food helped me notice different aspects of the object I never saw before.

Parents and educators are often faced with the challenge of providing food that is nutritious but also delicious to the children’s taste buds. Click on the link below for a resource on Lactose Intolerance for more information on the common childhood sensitivity to food as well as easy meal suggestions.

http://www.nationaldairycouncil.org/SiteCollectionDocuments/health_wellness/lactose_intolerance/UpdatedLactoseandYourChild0906B.pdf

References

Schirrmacher, R., & Fox, J. E. (2009). Art & Creative Development for Young Children (6 ed.). Belmont, CA: Delmar.