Arnold Zwicky's Blog

Yesterday, a news story (from an Ohio site) with this summary of its subject, Madelyn Varela:

Ohio’s viral lesbian cheesemonger

This builds in sound from its onset to its cheesemonger climax, which was something of a surprise (just on likelihood, I was expecting goatfarmer); and its content comes across like a series of random pings: Ohio; then a lot of followers (viral here means, roughly ‘widely circulated, with many followers’); then, whoa, a dyke; and, who would have guessed, a seller of cheese (in a word, a cheesemonger). A lovely bit of found poetry.

So, of course, I gilded it.

Varelamonging

Ohio’s
Viral
Lesbian
Cheesemonger

Slings cheese, films cheese,
Composes still lifes of
Cheese, coinciding with your
Sexual identity

Oh Madelyn Madelyno Mademongo
I am hot melted cheese,
Fondue aflame

Come
Dip your
Sticks of
Hard
Bread
Into me

Notes. From the Rights Factory site on Madelyn Varela:

Madelyn is a 23-year-old cheesemonger from Cleveland, Ohio.  She has garnered almost 300,000 followers on her page @cheezytalkwithmadelyn, across both TikTok and Instagram. She provides easily digestible [AZ: sigh] video summaries of cheese with an approachable and non-snobby ideology.  After years of learning and making cheese, she is now learning the retail part of the industry as the lead cheesemonger at a large specialty grocery store. She has been in the cheese and dairy industry her entire adult life [AZ: she’s 23, so her adult life has been, generously, 6 years] and became a cheese maker right out of high school.

When she finds herself taking a break from slinging cheese, filming videos of cheese, eating cheese, or anything else cheese, she enjoys cooking and going to museums. The support from her two cats, family, and friends is what makes it all happen!

She creates cheese boards reflecting — she says “coinciding with” — sexual identities. She’s fully engaged in these creations, which exploit the symbolic and cultural values of food, so they have a certain eccentric charm. You can view a reel about her lesbian-themed cheese plate here.

This entry was posted on November 22, 2025 at 10:45 am and is filed under Gender and sexuality, Language and food, Language and sexuality, Poetry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.