By Lenn Thompson, Executive Editor

Aaronestes As the New York Cork Report continues to evolve and grow, it's important that we never lose sight of the fact that wine (and beer) are not meant to be enjoyed in a vacuum.

You need food and friends to get the most out of wine and vice versa.

With that in mind, please welcome Aaron Estes our new Cheese Editor.

I've known Aaron for just over five years — a fact that I'm able to remember only because I first met him at his wedding, which was only a couple months before my own. I do remember my own anniversary and thus sort of know when his is as well.

Our wives went to college together and have been friends for a long time  — and sometimes those forced college-friend's-significant-other friends work out, I guess. This is one of those times, and many of the best "meals" Nena and I have had over the past five years have barely been meals at all in the traditional sense. Instead they often involved Aaron, his wife Christine and a table filled with cheese, cured meat, bread, olives…and of course wine and beer.

An IT project manager by day, cheesemaker and cheesemonger by night,
Aaron
became a serious cheese freak a couple of years ago while
spending
time in Wisconsin on an opera gig. Yes. He's a singer too…just like Nena and Christine.

When
he isn't making cheese
at home (quite well I might add), mongering at Lucy's Whey at Manhattan's Chelsea Market, or traveling to various farms
for classes or inspiration, you can find him trying to put his passion
for cheese and pairings into words at the Cave-Aged Blog.

For
the New York Cork Report, he'll be writing about the New York cheese
industry and artisanal cheeses made in New York. There are some amazing cheeses being made in New York and they deserves more attention in much the same way New York wines do. 

If nothing else, I look forward to "researching" some co-written posts about cheese and wine pairings.