I'm not much of an ice cream eater, Alex, but I'll ask them if I ever get a chance . I've taken the tour at the Tillamook cheese factory a couple of times; it's a hoot.

I've seen lemon curd in jars at the market, but never had any. I've always assumed it was a sort of lemon filling for tarts and such. Now I'll have to try it.

Good cheese availability does vary around the country here in the USA. The West Coast in general is pretty food-obsessed, and here in Oregon we make a lot of good wines and microbrewed beers. I think that helps a lot when it comes to a good selection of both domestic and imported gourmet foods, especially in recent years. When I was a kid, you could find cheddar, swiss (dreadful rubbery domestic stuff), jack cheese, and peculiar orange cheese spreads in jars. Mozzarella seemed exotic. Now I can waltz in and buy thiry different varieties if I feel like it.

And whoever mentioned that Norwegian delicacy known as gjetost... my husband introduced me to that years ago when we were first dating. He spent a year in Norway as an exchange student when he was sixteen and got addicted to the stuff. When we were married, his host parents came all the way from Norway for the wedding... with five pounds of gjetost tucked into their luggage. Yum!