Portuguese Cheese in Santa Rosa

The Matos Cheese Factory is a little hard to find without fairly explicit directions (see below).  We drove down several farm roads which might have technically been in Santa Rosa but looked more like unincorporated Sonoma Valley.  Eventually, we found a promising if rather dilapidated sign.

On our way in to the "factory", really just a few barns and a house, we saw where the cheese comes from.  It doesn't get any more "locally produced" than this!

Some Portuguese folk in aprons and hairnets were standing around the yard.  One of them motioned us toward a door on the back of the house which was actually labelled "Matos Cheese Factory."  Inside, we found a closet-sized room with a counter, a scale, and a cut wheel of cheese below the counter.

Through a door from this room was the aging room, which was fairly impressive.  Wow, that's a lot of cheese.  Each of those wheels is about 40lbs.  Clearly they're not running out of cheese anytime soon.

A woman came out (one of the ones from the yard) and in limited English I arranged to buy two pounds of cheese.  That was the best surprise, only $7 per pound.  Wooo-hoo!  She cut us two wedges and wrapped them.  From the wrapper, we learned that the cheese actually does have a name: St. Jorge. 

"Obrigado," I said, which made her smile. 

"Você fala o português?" she asked.

"No." I shook my head.

The cheese was delicious.  Yellow-white and full of tiny holes, the flavor is somewhere between a Jarlsberg and aged Gouda.  It also melts quite well, and goes very well with wine.  So I set out to buy some wine to go with it ...

Directions: It's on Llano road. Exit 116 West from the 101.  Turn right off 116 onto Llano at Llano Antiques, a conveniently red and unmistakable establishment. The Cheese Factory sign will be on the left just before you reach Todd Road. It looks like about a mile and a half from 116 to the farm road.