Making Cheese Is Her Calling

<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/21/nyregion/21CONN.html?ei=5007&amp;en=b7090c05be6532e4&amp;ex=1387515600&amp;partner=USERLAND&amp;pagewanted=all&amp;position=" title="Connecticut: Making Cheese Is Her Calling; Make That Her Second Calling">Connecticut: Making Cheese Is Her Calling; Make That Her Second Calling</a>: &ldquo;When Mother Noella Marcellino first focused a microscope more than a decade ago on cheese she had made by hand at the Benedictine abbey in Bethlehem, she had no idea she would become the celebrated champion of France&rsquo;s famous raw-milk cheeses, the centuries-old ways they are made, and the tiny microorganisms that help flavor them.



&ldquo;Along the way, this 52-year-old former college dropout also has won a prestigious Fulbright scholarship, earned a University of Connecticut doctorate in microbiology, and achieved near rock-star status among cheesemakers and cheese-lovers, both here and abroad.



&ldquo;Last week, Mother Noella was honored by the French food industry with its first French Food Spirit Award in the category of science advancement for promoting an understanding of its cheeses and helping to preserve the traditional ways of making them.



&ldquo;Next year, wearing her black nun&rsquo;s habit and irresistible smile, Mother Noella will star in a national PBS documentary film, called &lsquo;The Cheese Nun: Sister Noella's Voyage of Discovery.&rsquo;&rdquo;