I’ve been cooking with a lot of cheeses recently but haven’t had much time to scout out new ones. So, when I saw that my veg box supplier had added a new cheese to its catalogue, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to sound it out.
Category Archives: cheese
Yorkshire Fettle
I once met someone who told me that his friend had written her dissertation about cheese names. It might sound a bit daft and perhaps the sort of thing that would trigger a spluttering Daily Mail article about the pointlessness of academia. But, actually, I think it sounds quite interesting. Cheese names can often tell an informative or evocative story. They can be geographical (Fosse Way Fleece, Parlick Fell), historical (Edmund Tew, Howard) or even linguistic (Norfolk Mardler, Mouth Almighty). I had heard about Yorkshire Fettle precisely because of how it came by its name but hadn’t managed to track any down, so was chuffed when Aldi sent me some to try as part of their new range:
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Edmund Tew
If there were a prize for the cheese with the best story behind its name, Edmund Tew would be right up there as a contender. Alas, there isn’t such a gong and so the cheese had to make do with winning Gold at the 2015 British Cheese Awards, which isn’t too bad either when you think about it.
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St Gluvias
Cheese-making in Britain seems to be going stratospheric at the moment. Just when I start to think I’ve heard of every producer going, I turn my back to deal with another courgette glut and – boom! – by the time I’m back, there’s another five popped up. Predictably, a recent visit to the Global Cheese Awards unearthed several cheese-makers new to me, one of whom makes St Gluvias. I bought the smoked version because it’s autumn now and I always go a bit mad for smoked cheese at this time of year. See – I’ve even put it on a seasonally-appropriate fabric:
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Rosary Ash Goat’s Cheese
Last weekend saw us on a camping trip, as ever featuring limited sleep, the ever-present threat of rain and the usual one in ten odds of vomiting (it wasn’t us this time). In amongst this unalloyed pleasure, we also got to enjoy the beauty of the New Forest. Grazing ponies (and some donks with a deathwish), scrub and furze and babbling brooks, perfect for paddling. Striking and scenic but not, at first glance, obvious cheese country. However, this week’s cheese hails from just up the road from our buffeted tent:
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Quicke’s Elderflower Clothbound Cheddar
What season are we in right now? It’s easy to lose track. The last four months seem to have merged into one long biblical downpour, punctuated only by the briefest teasing sun-spells. Fortunately, I came across a froth of elderflowers recently, soggy but defiant, the last on the bush, to remind me that apparently it’s summer.
They also served to remind me about one of the cheeses that I’d tried back in April, when I visited Devon, but never got round to writing about: Quicke’s Elderflower Cheddar.
Quicke’s Elderflower Cheddar is a hard, pasteurised, cow’s milk cheese, produced by Mary Quicke and her team at Newton St Cyres, near Exeter in Devon. The Quicke family have been farming the pastures here for more than 450 years and the operation is now run by fourteenth-generation Mary Quicke, with other family members. Herds of cows, cross-bred to produce quality (as opposed to quantity) milk roam the fields, where the temperate climate of the West Country bestows a perfect balance of sun and showers.
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Snowdrop
This week’s cheese had a lot to live up to. I’d bought it once before at an agricultural show and then left it in my mother-in-law’s fridge before I’d even opened it. By all accounts they enjoyed eating it. When I managed to buy some more, on another visit to the West Country, it was the first thing I checked had gone into the cool box in the car.
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Isle of Wight Blue
I find myself drawn to cheeses for different reasons: maybe because I want to try something from a new region; maybe because I just fancy a certain type of cheese; or sometimes for a random reason. In this case, I thought it had gorgeously striking packaging, so – boom – it was in the bag:
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Cornish Gouda with Honey and Clover
I recently wrote about my conversion to cheese with bits in (not that ‘full turkey dinner’ stuff, though, I draw the line at that). Whereas I used to shy away from any cheese that had been ‘mucked about with’ (to quote one cheese professional I met), I am now willing to give such cheeses a try, having found such beauties as Posbury and Vulscombe. So it was that when I recently ordered some cheese, I added this one to the basket:
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Olde York
I’m off to Devon for Easter and am looking forward to seeking out some little-known West Country cheeses. However, I’ve become aware recently that my selections have been displaying a distinct southern bias. So, to redress the balance before I go away, to give Margaret at From Pyrenees to Pennines a fighting chance at tracking down a cheese (they stock it in Booths!) and to please my mother, this week’s selection is from Yorkshire:
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Fromage Homage 