Whether it's soft, simple and fresh or dry, aged and complex,  I never met a goat cheese I couldn't love.

Furthermore, my love of goat cheese extends to the goats themselves.  I'm crazy about 'em and would gladly have two or three romping in the garden of my suburban condo, if I didn't know they would devour everything, including the cushions on the deck chairs.

Goat cheese, also known as chevre, has a distinctive flavor and aroma, although it can be made in many styles, just like cow's milk cheese.  One thing that sets it apart is its humble origin. Although goat cheese now is a fashionable commodity, in the past the goat was known as the "poor man's cow" because people who were too poor to keep cows could support less-fussy goats.

Unfortunately, San Diego County is a "goat-cheese deprived area," in the words of Rex Backus, husband of Saint Helena goat-cheese maker Barbara Backus.  Oddly enough, no one here produces goat cheese commercially, even though our dry climate and rugged terrain are the very substance of traditional goat-cheese country.

So I was brimming with excitement as I prepared to visit some of the artisans behind the movement to produce fine American goat cheeses in the French tradition. I headed for Napa and Sonoma counties, where it seems there are goat dairies around every bend.

On the way, I stopped in Atascadero, just north of San Luis Obispo. I visited Sadie Kendall, a pioneer in California goat-cheese production, who relinquished her goats several years ago to concentrate on a delicious but less-labor-intensive cow's milk creme fraiche.

Kendall began making goat cheese more than 20 years ago while she was a philosophy undergraduate at California State University Northridge.  Her passion led her to develop the first mold-ripened goat cheese on the market, and to return to school for a degree in dairy science at Cal Poly.

She made goat cheese for the commercial market while still in school and even developed a Stilton-like goat cheese, touted by Jeremiah Tower in his book "New American Classics."

Kendall and I packed boxes full of Kendall Farms Creme Fraiche for shipment to California and the East Coast at her dairy on the grounds of Atascadero State Hospital. Kendall leases the dairy facilities from the institution, where, she explained, inmates once were trained to become dairymen and cheesemakers.

Perfect setting

Next on my agenda was an afternoon with Steven Schack at Redwood Hill Goat Dairy in Sebastopol. The dairy and cheesemaking facility, set among redwoods and overlooking Iron Horse Vineyards, is pristine and new, having been designed by an architect especially for the dairy's needs.

Schack and his wife, Jennifer Bice, began their careers as breeders of dairy goats and producers of raw milk.

"We started 30 years ago with raw goat milk. We're the only dairy in the state still producing it today," he boasted.

It was but a few steps down the road for Schack and Bice to turn their surplus milk into cheese and yogurt. Five of Redwood Hill's seven cheeses won awards at the American Cheese Society's national convention in 1997, and Schack and I tasted them all in the couple's dining room, kept cool and dark in the heat of the day.

We began with a carton of Redwood Hill's smooth, creamy goat's milk yogurt, apricot-mango flavor. Since the goat's milk isn't homogenized, the small fat globules remain suspended in the yogurt, leaving a texture and flavor unlike the commercial brands found in supermarkets.

Next we tried Redwood Hill's soft, fresh chevre, which comes in three spreadable flavors -- three peppercorn, garlic and chive, and plain -- and which is packed in what Redwood Hill refers to as "user friendly, resealable plastic tubs," a useful departure from the classic French log.

Redwood Hill also makes a raw feta (which tops my list of favorite
razor-sharp cheeses) and a good pasteurized feta, a smooth, creamy Teleme cheese (good for melting), a California Crottin that closely approximates the French version, and the Camembert-like Camellia.

Famous name

I drove on to Sonoma to talk with goat-cheese maven Laura Chenel, who has created what is hands-down the most commercially successful gourmet goat-cheese venture in the country.

Her cheeses are sold through Williams-Sonoma's mail-order catalog and shipped around the country from her Sonoma dairy. She makes the fresh goat cheese logs currently sold under Trader Joe's label. And her high-quality cheeses can be found in gourmet emporiums and restaurants across the United States.

Asked how she saw her livelihood in relation to California cuisine -- to what Alice Waters has achieved in the restaurant world -- Chenel thought for a moment before replying.

"People have lost their connection to the earth," she finally said. "I see it all as a part of the same movement toward greater appreciation (of) food and connection to the land."

At Chenel's dairy on the outskirts of Sonoma, an inspector was making his regular rounds of the cheese-making facilities, so Chenel and I went where we both wanted to go anyway -- the barns, to visit her beautiful herd of 450 goats.

Individual goats would come to nuzzle us, and I was amazed to discover that Chenel knew each of them by name. Her genuine affection for these intelligent, inquisitive animals was evident. She wandered through the barns talking to the goats as if they were so many children, and as we entered the immaculately clean milking room, Chenel laughingly described the pandemonium that broke out the day the electricity went out and all the goats had to be milked by hand.

Chenel makes a line that ranges from the traditional fresh cheeses to softy, creamy fromage blanc to a Cabecou marinated in olive oil. There's also a delicious traditional surface-ripened Crottin, a Taupiniere (a surface-ripened cheese originally from Bordeaux), and her only hard cheese, a Tome aged for six months.

Asked which is her favorite cheese, Chenel smiled. "I love each of them for their own being . . . it's like having children."

Eye appeal

My last stop on the trail of the perfect goat cheese was just north of Santa Cruz at Sea Stars Goat Cheese.

Proprietor Nancy Gaffney keeps mostly Alpine and Toggenberg goats, and when I inquired about the lone Nubian doe and her kid in their own pen, Gaffney replied, "That's Gaia and her kid, Almond. They belong to Joan Baez, and she has left them here while she's on tour. Joan wants to learn how to make goat's cheese when she returns, and I've offered to teach her."

Gaffney had just returned from the American Cheese Society convention in Madison, Wis., where her efforts had been well-rewarded. Her Chevre in Oil took first place in the Marinated Cheese division for the second year in a row. And a third place was awarded to her colorful Van Goght, a delightful fresh cheese with edible flowers on top.

Sea Stars' cheeses are unique in that many of them are decorated with edible flowers, fruits and herbs grown in Gaffney's own organic garden. Gaffney also makes goat cheese tortes topped with sundried tomatoes and basil, smoked salmon and dill, and apricots and pistachios. I have become addicted to her Cranberry Walnut Torte, a firm fromage blanc layered with chopped walnuts and dried cranberries.

Her Monet Chevre is layered with fresh flower petals and herbs. She offers seasonal cheeses such as her summer Peaches and Dream, a comely combination of fromage blanc, peaches and ginger; cranberry-walnut or tomato-basil holiday trees; a Star of David with blue and yellow interlocking flowers; and a Valentines tray of mini-hearts. She also produces a chevre log covered in red, white and blue flowers for the Fourth of July, a Pumpkin Spice Fromage Blanc for Halloween, and flower-coated goat cheese Easter
eggs at Easter time.

Gaffney's cheeses are frivolous and playful; some purists might complain that her use of unusual flavors detracts from the serious nature of the cheese itself; but let them turn up their noses. That leaves all the more for the rest of us to enjoy.

Winning tradition

Mary Keehn's Cypress Grove is off the beaten path as far as goat-cheese producers are concerned, in the small, often-foggy coastal town of McKinleyville Arcata in Humboldt County.

Keehn began by making cheese at home for her family, and when a friend opened a restaurant, Keehn obtained 50 gallons of milk and made cheese for the restaurant and anyone else who would buy it. Like many of California's goat-cheese makers, Keehn said that she originally "came from love of goats, rather than a dairy business background."

And like some of the others, she eventually gave up her herd of goats in
order to turn her time and attention to the production of cheese. Her
business has been highly successful, and her cheeses are currently
distributed in California, Oregon, Washington and several major cities on the East Coast.

Keehn can boast at least one gold medal for each of her cheeses. At this year's American Cheese Society judging, her superlative Humboldt Fog, a surface-ripened cheese with a layer of ash sandwiched between two layers of light, flavorful cheese, took first place for American Original Goat Milk Cheese and was named Best in Show Goat Cheese. A layer of sterile ash originally was used in cheesemaking to keep the milk's surface clean.

Her surface-ripened Bermuda Triangle, Cypress Grove Chevre and Cypress Grove Fromage Blanc also captured awards. In short, Keehn cleaned up.

"A cheesemaker's culture is always a carefully guarded secret, one of the things that makes a cheese made from an otherwise identical recipe have more flavor, a better texture, or age more smoothly," Keehn said. "We think that the cultures we use give Cypress Grove products that something extra that has earned a gold medal for every product we produce."

She noted that when she made her first visit to France, 12 years after
starting Cypress Grove, she found "that our recipe and methods were almost exactly the same as those of the cheese-makers we visited in Provence."

Sources

Look for Cypress Grove, Sea Stars, Laura Chenel and Redwood Hills cheeses  and yogurt, and Kendall Farms Creme Fraiche, at Whole Foods markets; the La Jolla store has a particularly large selection. Laura Chenel's cheese can also be mail-ordered from the Williams-Sonoma catalog.

Kendall has written a charming compilation of creme fraiche recipes, "The Creme Fraiche Cookbook," which can be ordered from Kendall Farms, P.O. Box 686, Atascadero, CA 93423.

Laura Chenel's Chèvre, Sonoma, (707) 996-4477. Chèvre, mold-ripened, ash-covered and marinated cheeses sold in good stores.

Yerba Santa Diary, Lakeport, (707) 263-8131. Chris and Jan Twohy's aged Alpine Shepherd cheese is available by phone or e-mail: yerbasanta44@hotmail.com.

Goat's Leap, St. Helena. Barbara Backus' celebrated ash-coated goat cheeses, Sumi and Eclipse, and aged Carmela are available from Tomales Bay Foods, Point Reyes Station, (415) 663-9335.

Cypress Grove Chèvre, Arcata, (707) 825-1100; http://www.cypressgrovechevre.com. Goat cheeses from chèvre to Cheddar and the signature Humboldt Fog, available by mail order and in good stores. UPDATED 11/06

Emily Thomson Fromage de Chèvre, Ojai, (805) 649-4884. Fresh chèvre, fromage blanc and marinated chèvre sold at Santa Monica farmers market Saturday.

Harley Farms Goat Cheese, Pescadero, (650) 879-0480. Dee Harley makes a soft cream cheese filled with spicy condiments, such as sun-dried tomatoes and basil, imprinted on the top with edible flowers, and gives them merry names, such as Van Goat. By mail order, and in good stores.

Bodega Goat Cheese, Bodega, (707) 876-3483. Javier Salmon and Patty Karlin sell chèvre and Peruvian-style goat cheeses at the San Francisco Ferry Plaza farmers market Saturday and the Marin County Civic Center farmers market Sunday.

Skyhill Farms, Napa Valley, (707) 255-4800. Yogurt, chèvre and a ricotta-style cheese called "Ri-Goatta" sold at Trader Joe's and health-food stores.