Chaource French Cheese AOC, 22% Fat In the absence of written evidence, legend has it that the Chaource cheese was created by monks in the Abbey of Pontigny in Burgundy in the Middle Ages. The expertises in the monastery were passed on to the surrounding farms. In the 19th century the cheese became the product of choice on the table of the Queen of France, Margaret of Burgundy wife of Louis X, King of France. Consequently, the Chaource cheese made by the village farmers in the south of the humid Champagne and Auxerrois regions became the cheese of choice among French families.