Good Taste: A cheese ideal for holiday entertaining

To fans of the legendary and rare fromage called Vacherin Mont d'Or (the French raw-milk version is illegal in the U.S.), any bloomy-rind cheese with a creamy center and a band of spruce bark wrapped around its edge is bound to elicit curiosity. For a while, the pasteurized brand called l'Édel de Cléron was a fair stand-in for a Vacherin craving, until mass production inevitably sapped some of its character. A far better option - and one ideal for holiday entertaining - is Harbison, a 10-ounce bloomy-rind disk wrapped in spruce by the brilliant Vermont cellars of Jasper Hill Creamery. Created initially three years ago with leftover curds from their larger Moses Sleeper, the paste has a freshness and unctuous spoonability I crave. But with that resinous strip of bark hugging its edges, it also takes on flavors of mushroom, smoke, and roasty cauliflower, and a woody tang that hovers on the tongue like an autumn walk in the forest.

- Craig LaBan
Harbison, $22 a 10 oz. round, Talula's Daily, 208 W. Washington Square, 215-592-6555.