Say cheese!—the CA Artisan Cheese Festival is Saturday at Grace Pavilion with cheese and accompaniments

Tomales Farmstead Creamery’s Atika is just one of the cheesy delicacies at Saturday’s California Artisan Cheese Festival. Atika, a blend of sheep and goat milk in roughly equal parts, smells like warm melted butter and crème fraiche.  This a farmstead cheese: the goats and sheep are raised and milked on the same farm that the cheese is made and the milk is as fresh as it can possibly be. Aged at least 5 months, Atika has a buttery and tart flavor. ARThound loves Farmstead Creamery because it reached out to Marin’s beloved artist, Tom Killion, who created the woodcut that ultimately became their beautiful label. Photo: Kelly J. Owen

After a two-year pandemic pause, the California Artisan Cheese Festival returns live to the Sonoma County Fairgrounds’ Grace Pavilion and Shade Park with a single event, an Artisan Cheese Tasting & Marketplace, this Saturday, May 7 from 11 to 4 p.m.  Traditionally, this popular cheese tasting extravaganza and marketplace has concluded the weekend long festival, providing a chance for cheese enthusiasts to buy all the fabulous cheeses they’re tasted along with new, limited-production, and rare artisan cheeses as well as other amazing products. This year, over 60 award-winning cheeses will be offered for tasting and sold at this event, along with all sorts of accompaniments including wines, ciders, beers, chocolate, crackers, salts, spices and other artisan products.  The Festival will be expanded to include the adjoining outdoor Shade Park area so guests will have more room to relax and enjoy the experience, including live entertainment by local Sonoma County-based Jazz band, King Street Giants. “We are excited to be back in-person this year and featuring so many local favorites and over a dozen new purveyors,” said Judy Groverman Walker, the Event Producer of the California Artisan Cheese Festival.   Here are this year’s participants.   Tickets: $30-75; purchase directly at venue.