A couple of years ago, when I went to the South Beach Food & Wine fest, I signed up for a lot of mailing lists. One of them was information about cheese from Ile de France. I love cheese. They’d send me e-coupons and everything. A month or so ago, they sent me a note, asking if I have a blog, and if so, would I like to get some free cheese. The only condition would be to eat the cheese and then write about it. DUDE! Free cheese and a free blog topic? I’m on that. I sent them a yes, please and the link to this page. Amazingly, unlike some people who read this as a sample of my work, they were not horrified, and in fact, accepted my offer. A week or so ago I received a big log of chevre.  I love goat cheese, especially, so I was really jazzed to get the package. But what’s this? There is a new wrinkle in the free cheese offer. Now they are asking me to develop a recipe using this chevre, and submit it to their contest. First prize? Five hundred dollars. Second and third prizes? More cheese. Hmmmmmm. Is there a bad prize? Can I get both money and more cheese?

Having given this some consideration, I am down to two recipes. The first is a sort of Chicken Kiev, but instead of butter, I will roll the goat cheese in the center of the pounded, breaded chicken breast. I have some herbs de Provence (lavender, thyme, lemon peel) to add. Maybe something green, like asparagus? Or sun-dried tomatoes? My second is a goat cheese quiche. I haven’t quite figured out what to use in it…maybe peas? Anyway, which do you think I should develop and submit?