Le Camembert. Marie Harel created the original Camembert cheese from raw milk in Normandy, France in 1791. Today, however, a very small percentage of producers make cheese from raw milk with the same process as Marie Harel would have used. Those who produce cheese using Marie Harel’s method, can legally call their cheese Camembert Normandie under the AOC guidelines. However, the production of Camembert cheese has now transcended the AOC designation. Very good varieties of Camembert cheese made from pasteurized milk can be found in Normandy today.

The fresh Camembert cheese is bland, hard and crumbly in texture. Young Camembert has a milky and sweet taste. As the cheese matures it forms a smooth, runny interior and a white bloomy rind that is typical to Camembert cheese.

The Camembert gets coated by a bloomy white rind caused by a white fungus called Penicillium candidum and is put on the shelf to age for a few weeks. At 30 to 35 days, the cheese has reached “a point,” the French expression for perfect ripeness.

 For a group of bioengineers, that moldy rind is one of nature’s greatest living surfaces, doing double duty as a shield and a cleaner. The rind allows the cheese’s deep flavor and aroma to mature, but also defends it against microorganisms that could spoil it. The cheese repays the fungi on the rind by supplying it with nutrients.

 The Camembert rind has also been compared to human skin.

When the integrity of the rind or skin is challenged, through cutting a cheese or, in the case of a person, a wound, the integrity of the interior of the cheese (or person) is also challenged.

 So critical is the rind to the integrity of the cheese that Camembert connoisseurs insist the cheese should be eaten within two to three days once its seal has been broken.

 More than 52 millions of Camembert boxes are produced each year.