Pumpkin spice craze inspires a new Canadian cheese

The pumpkin spice craze, often associated withseasonal coffees and teas, is influencingthe world of specialty cheeses. AfrimPristine helpedcreate a cheeseinspired by the popular flavour called the "Senator" which is making its debut at theOttawa Wine and Food Festival this weekend.

"We juiced some pumpkins, we added tonka beans, we added coffee, some herbs and spice...to create this beautiful goodness," he told host Alan Nealon CBC Radio's All in a Day on Thursday.

Pristine, theworld's youngest cheese master ormatrefromager said he wanted to create a cheesethat reminded people of fall."I think cheese, you should eat in seasons,just like everything else," he said.

"The cheese is orange naturally. That pumpkin gives it a little more of that fall flavour," he said. "It's nutty, it's sweet. This a great dessert cheese."

Pristine has been surrounded by cheese his entirelife. His father and grandfatheropened the Cheese Boutique in Toronto in 1970. Pristine said he's worked all over the worldbut he learned everything about cheese from his family.

"I've done nothing else in life other than absorb from my family, absorb from my brother, cheese knowledge."

Pristine will be bringing more than10,000 kilos of cheese to fill a5,500 square foot cheese vaultfor the Ottawa show. There will be 24 cheesesfrom four countries, including a six-kilo, $1,200 wheel of caciotta, a rare goat's milk cheese created on a Tuscan farm where the cheeses are dipped in chestnut beer and wrapped in chestnut leaves for 18 months.

The Ottawa Wine and Food Festival runsfrom Nov. 4 to 6 at theEY Centre.