'Le Meunier' brings French cheese culture to Seoul as a fine-dining course

"When the French talk about gastronomy in everyday life, they mostly talk about wine and cheese. In France, cheese is recognized as a gastronomic culture in its own right."

A media event celebrating French food culture through cheese was recently held at the Apgujeong branch of Le Meunier in Gangnam-gu, Seoul. Le Meunier is a French specialty cheese brand that introduces to South Korea cheeses selected and aged by Rodolphe Le Meunier, who holds the MOF (Meilleur Ouvrier de France) certification — France's highest artisan distinction.

The program featured a course menu and a cooking class led by French chef Marc Toutain. It offered a preview of "Marc's Table," a lunch course Le Meunier will launch in September, along with a cooking class called "French Cuisine Atelier."

Chef Toutain is a 45-year veteran who has been decorated by the French government. He received the Chevalier de l'Ordre du Mérite Agricole in recognition of his contributions to the development of culinary culture.

The courses were paired with wines Le Meunier imports from France. The first course, an amuse-bouche, was a brouillade au caviar — a scrambled egg preparation served in an eggshell and topped with caviar. An amuse-bouche is a bite-sized morsel served before the formal courses begin.

The appetizer was a pannequet de saumon fumé, a smoked salmon dish made with Brillat-Savarin cheese. The name has an interesting origin: Yu Gwan-mun, head of Le Meunier Korea, described it as "a triple-cream cheese so delicious it was named after a French gastronome," adding that it is produced mainly in the Burgundy region. A sip of white wine — Chateau Bel-Air La Royer — after tasting the cheese brought out its deep, rich flavor.

The main course was a poularde aux morilles, sauce au Saint-Nectaire — a classic French chicken dish that frequently appears at state banquets in France. Chicken and morel mushrooms are braised in a Saint-Nectaire sauce; the cream sauce made from Saint-Nectaire cheese is rich yet not heavy, complementing the chicken well. Morel mushrooms (Morchella) have a distinctive appearance reminiscent of Middle Eastern dates, with a pleasantly chewy texture. They are considered a prized ingredient among French food enthusiasts.

Next came the Plateau de fromages Le Meunier, a platter featuring 10 cheeses — from Camembert and blue cheese to Comté and beyond.

According to Le Meunier, the proper way to taste a cheese platter is to start with milder cheeses and work toward stronger ones, moving from cow's milk to sheep's milk to goat's milk. The rind of hard cheeses such as Comté should not be eaten.

Dessert was a pomme rôtie au miel, crème épaisse — honey-roasted apple with crème épaisse. "Crème épaisse is rarely seen in Korea, but it is widely used in French cooking," the chef said. "It is especially essential when serving caviar."

Cheese falls into two broad categories: pasteurized and unpasteurized. Pasteurized cheese accounts for the bulk of commercially distributed cheese and is largely an industrial product. In the world of gastronomy, unpasteurized cheese takes center stage. "The microorganisms in cheese trigger chemical reactions with fats and protein to drive aging, which is what produces genuine flavor — pasteurization reduces microbial activity and results in comparatively less taste and aroma," Yu said. He added that South Korea restricts imports of unpasteurized cheese to only a limited range of varieties, making it difficult to experience the full diversity of French unpasteurized cheeses.

At the event, cheese was presented not merely as an ingredient but as a formal course in its own right. "The Gastronomic Meal of the French," inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2010, explicitly designates cheese as a course served before dessert in a formal meal. "In France, cheese is enjoyed as an independent course," Yu said. "The way it is described and served is itself part of a long gastronomic tradition."