In Gouda Heaven at the Reypenaer Cheese Tasting Experience

There’s a lot to see and do when visiting Amsterdam, but something you have to add to your to-do list is a cheese and wine tasting at the Reypenaer Cheese Tasting room in Amsterdam. This post is for anyone who wants to the ultimate cheese tasting experience when visiting Amsterdam. Read on to find out the best Gouda cheese to buy in Amsterdam, what Reypenaer cheese I fell in love with, and why you need to book this cheese and wine tasting experience! 

A highlight of any trip of mine is eating. Ok, scratch that, that’s pretty much the highlight of my life! I live to eat, and I absolutely love trying out new restaurants, going on food tours to explore the local cuisine, or cooking up a storm in the kitchen.

The Netherlands produces different types of cheeses, like Edam, Maasdam, Leyden, and gouda, the best Dutch cheese imo. And, what better way to get an introduction to the types of Dutch cheese and learn about cheese than with a cheese tasting?

While there are a number of Amsterdam cheese company tours to choose from, we chose a tour that came highly recommended from friends: a cheese and wine tasting experience with Reypenaer Cheese.

If you’re wondering how many types of cheese you get to taste in this tour, the Connoisseur cheese tasting (click to get tickets) is an hour-long tasting where you taste six of Reypenaer’s finest cheeses paired together with white wine, red wine, port wine, or non-alcoholic drinks. A wine and cheese event was an easy sell for us…I mean how can you resist tasting six different cheeses WITH wine?

The Reypenaer Tasting Room is located in a 17th century townhouse in Old Amsterdam, about a 10-minute walk from Centraal Station. It was easy for us to book our tickets online, and we ended up purchasing them on our phones the night before the tasting. But, keep in mind, this was back in November. I suspect with all the rave reviews, if you go in the spring/summer, make your booking in advance! 

The main floor comprises of the the cheese shop where you can sample the various varieties of cheese that Reypenaer produces and find some of the best cheese in Amsterdam. A walk downstairs to the cellar brings you to the site of the daily tastings: the cheese room.

Each wine & cheese tasting is taught by an expert cheese taster (talk about a tasty job title) who begins with an introduction to the Reypenaer cheese brand. Thanks to a semi-cheesy (pun-intended, hehe) informational video, you get to see the cheese factory, and hear all about the Reypenaer cheese company family business that started over 100 years ago and has a long, ripe history of artisanal cheese production.

 

Everyone was given a Reypenaer Cheese Tasting Certificate, which on completion of the tasting makes you a Tasting Master, an expert in cheese tasting if you will! More importantly, the certificate also gets you a discount on any purchases made at Reypenaer cheese shop in Amsterdam, which was music to my cheese-loving ears.

On the back of the certificate, there’s section to jot down your cheese tasting preferences. We were instructed to note down the color of each cheese, smell it, taste it, note its consistency, age, and finally grade it on a scale of 1-10.

Our tasting was divided up into two parts: we tasted three cheeses from the new warehouse, and three cheeses from the old warehouse. Reypenaer cheeses are made with no artificial ingredients or environmental conditions that would accelerate the ripening process. In fact, the old cheese factory warehouse in Woerden is still in use and any cheese ripened there has a different label than the rest.

Cheeses from the old warehouse are always labeled Reypenaer, while cheeses from Wijngaard (the new warehouse) are given different names such as Chèvre Affine, Chèvre gris, or Affineurs. The brand uses markings similar to those used on French Cognac to differentiate between the old cheeses.

Reypenaer is cheese that has been aged for 1 year, Reypenaer VSOP (if you’re curious as to what VSOP means, it’s very special old product) refers to cheese from the old warehouse that has been aged for 2 years/24 months, and Reypenaer XO is cheese that has been aged for 2.5-3 years.

We went into the tasting knowing nothing about Gouda or any of the other Dutch cheeses, and came out with a wealth of information. Did you know that ‘Gouda’ is not restricted to cheese from the Netherlands? So, if a cheese is just labeled Gouda, and not Gouda Holland (which is copyrighted in the EU), then it isn’t made with milk from Dutch cows or produced in the Netherlands!

As the cheese ages, they form cheese crystals, or what our cheese taster called crystals of goodness, giving the cheese a caramel flavor.

Yes, you read that right, you taste C A R A M E L when you eat cheese. Talk about messing with your mind.

My two favorites, the Reypenaer VSOP and the Reypenaer XO both tasted exactly like caramel on my palate, with the XO being saltier and extremely smooth. I have never tasted cheese that delicious before, and on my way out had to purchase a couple of blocks to take back home with me!

 
I have to say the tasting felt like I was back in a college classroom…but this class consisted of tasting cheese, and drinking wine. You know, fun things that didn’t happen when I was in college! If you love cheese, then the Reypenaer cheese tasting at their cheese store in Amsterdam is just for you! In addition to tasting some award-winning Reypenaer cheese, you also get an educational lesson on the Dutch cheese making and aging process. An hour very well spent!