Nopi's courgette and manouri cheese fritters

The big boom in restaurants doing breakfast has resulted in many more places offering inventive cheese dishes to start your day. This was an amazing dish I came across at Yotam Ottolenghi's Nopi last week where I attended the launch of David Lebovitz's glossy new book Ready for Dessert - an odd venue, really, when you think about it when it's all about puddings not cheese. Although I don't see any reason why you shouldn't make his delicious Ricotta Cheesecake with Orange and Aniseed for breakfast. Apart from the fact it contains a good slug of marsala, perhaps.

Anyway, back to Ottolenghi's fritters which were amazing. Lighter than fritters have any right to be though I'm not sure if you followed the recipe which I happily came across in the Guardian here they would be the puffy balls in the restaurant rather than the slighly flat burger-shaped patties in the recipe shot. They come with lime flavoured yoghurt which was wonderfully refreshing and some punchy bitter leaves.

They also served some really delicious chard and feta (I think) pastries at Nopi with black and white sesame seeds on the base which look really easy to knock up.


Sometimes the cheese thing gets a bit out of hand, though. This rather unlovely dish with house braised beans, salted ricotta, lemon, mint and poached egg at the hip Clerkenwell breakfast spot St Ali was less well thought out. Particularly as you had the rather weird option of ordering it with a kipper.

Have you come across any good breakfast dishes that include cheese lately?

PS you can see many more beautiful pix of the breakfast delights at Nopi on David Lebovitz's blog here. Meaning more beautiful pictures than mine ;-)

The ultimate cheeselover's weekend

If you love cheese, visit the West Country the last weekend of October.

There are two great all-day events on.

On Saturday 29th there's the Fine Cheese Company's cheese festival at Milsom Place in Bath which features over 20 artisanal cheesemakers. I went last year and it was fab. You get a fantastic chance to taste the best of British cheeses.

And on the Sunday Trethowan's Dairy and I have our latest Cheese School which is being held for the first time in the beautiful Barley Wood Walled Garden (above) at Wrington, just outside Bristol. Inspired by the surroundings - there are also some amazing orchards there - we are going to focus on cheese and apples and apple flavoured drinks including, of course, cider and local cheesemaker Tim Homewood of Homewood Cheeses will be showing you how to make your own cheese in the old cider barn.

There will also be talks from Joe Schneider producer of what I think is currently Britain's best blue cheese, Stichelton, an unpasteurised version of Stilton, a French v British cheese tasting and a wine and beer 'smackdown' to see which is the best drink with cheese - or at least the cheeses we field on the day.

You can find more information and booking details on the Cheese School website including some recommended places to stay. The picture below, by Rob of Eat Pictures, is of our 'Amazing Tastes' session where you get the chance to create your own cheese plates and boards!

Two new ways of serving goats cheese

Our fortnight in France has produced a couple of new ideas for serving cheese - as it usually does.

The first was an elegant course in a restaurant that should by rights have had a Michelin star, La Renaissance in Argentan which is also considerably more interesting than it looks from the website. Small balls of goats cheese were mixed with apricot and chopped lavender and set in the centre of fine, crisp savoury biscuits. There were also shards of apricot alongside and some kind of apricotty syrup, hard to determine, admittedly, in the rather fuzzy low-light picture above.

You almost certainly wouldn't want to go to that trouble but you could easily prepare the cheese that way and serve it with homemade breadsticks or biscuits. We'd finished our wine by that point but it would have been perfect with a sweet wine like a Jurançon or a Pacherenc-de-Vic-Bilh.


The other was at a wine bar in Bédarieux called Chai Christine Cannac where they served goats cheeses of different ages with honey, fleur-de-sel (coarse, unprocessed sea salt) and olive oil. The rather dishevelled appearance of the slate is due to the fact that it was ordered not by us but the next door table. When I was asking Ms Cannac about it she said she was sure her friends wouldn't mind if I took a snap of it. So I did.

Serving cheese with salt is of course not the healthiest option but I can imagine it would add an appealing crunch. A bit like that gorgeous French butter with salt crystals.

Why Alex James's Asda cheeses are a rip-off

Having been away this week I've only just picked up on the debate on ex Blur guitarist Alex James' foray into flavoured cheese. Apparently he's collaborated with Asda in developing a range of cheeses flavoured with tomato ketchup, salad cream and tikka masala paste among others.

I'm not going to rehearse all the arguments here as they've already been well covered by the Guardian Word of Mouth blog and fellow blogger Chris Pople's Cheese and Biscuits. And to be fair I haven't tried the cheeses but it seems to me there's a principle at stake.

Which is why does a (presumably) rich ex-rock star who has already established a reputation for making artisanal cheese need to get into bed with a supermarket? Couldn't he have used his clout, as he initially did, to boost Britain's small cheesemakers?

I imagine the justification is that it encourages kids (and, given the retro nature of the flavours, unhealthy adults) to eat cheese but is it not more about creating a 'value added' product for which Asda can charge more than its basic cheddar?

Even James's own 'Best Ever' cheddar at £10 a kilo is £2.50 a kilo less than his ready sliced Cheddar with Salad Cream 'blankets'. You can buy Cathedral City mature cheddar at Asda at the time of writing for £5.71 a kilo while Asda's own mild cheddar will only set you back a fiver. A whole jar of Asda Smartprice salad cream which you could slather all over your sarnie costs just 50p.

And the free publicity from the controversy must be worth several hundred thousand pounds for the chain.

At least Jamie Oliver in his collaboration with Sainsbury's tried to raise the bar for their customers.

Maybe James has run through his millions. Maybe they all have. Blur has apparently got together to record a new album. But I still doubt, despite his protestations of being 'hugely passionate' about his new range, that he eats Asda cheeses at home.

James hits back at his critics on Asda's blog by labelling them 'food prigs' and 'snooty imposters' so what do you think? Should he be using his influence this way or would you do the same in his place?

Where to buy cheese at a service station (in France, of course)

One of the redeeming features of French service stations is that they almost all sell a good selection of local products. At the aire Les Volcans d'Auvergne on the A71 just north of Clermont Ferrand, however, they go overboard selling giant packs of dried mushrooms, industrial-sized jars of potée, Puy lentils (of course) and all manner of weird and wonderful liqueurs and eaux de vie. But the main attraction is a full-blown cheese counter where you can buy the Auvergne's many excellent cheeses.

On Thursday as we were passing through there were whole Saint Nectaires and piles of garlicky Gaperons, Salers and Cantal, Bleu d'Auvergne and at least half a dozen goats cheeses. And not just from one cheesemaker. Several local producers were represented.

The only downside in this heat (38°C today) is how to transport them without them deteriorating or stinking the car out. But if you've got tightly sealed cool box and are travelling down to - or back from - the south take advantage.

A simple sheep and goats' cheese board

Cheeseboards, as I've said, before don't have to be massive affairs featuring six or seven different cheeses. In fact it's far less wasteful if they're not.

Here's a simple one based on sheep and goats' cheeses from one of our two good local cheese shops Chandos Deli in Bristol. Top left a fresh young pecorino, at the bottom a silky-textured Montenebro goats' cheese and top right (and below) a slightly Roquefort-ish Beenleigh Blue ewes cheese from Robin Congdon of Ticklemore Cheese in south Devon. All have character but none are too strong which makes them a good selection for a red wine such as rioja. And equally good for someone who's intolerant to cows' milk.

And I like their paleness against the dark grey slate.

An interesting veggie lasagne

I'm never totally convinced by veggie lasagnes but this open lasagne, ordered at our local Italian Rosemarino, was a cracker. Granted it doesn't look much (though my hastily snatched low-light picture doesn't help) but the combination of ingredients - spinach, walnuts and fontina cheese - was spot on.

I found some similar recipes on the Bon Appetit site here and this recipe site so it's probably just a question of adding some chopped toasted walnuts to your spinach (along with some other ingredients, obviously) and using a mild, melting cheese like Fontina. Or maybe making a walnut paste as Georgio Locatelli does in his superb Made in Italy Food and Stories. Walnuts seem to be a much more common element in savoury dishes in Italy than they are here.

Anyway I've asked the restaurant for the recipe. Cross fingers they're willing to share it! (And they've come up with the goods! See below though I reckon it would serve at least 8)

Lasagna Vegetarina
Open lasagne of spinach, ricotta, walnut & fontina
(serves 6)

Ingredients

For the filling:
1kg of baby leaf spinach
1kg of Ricotta cheese
200g of toasted, chopped walnuts
4 large shallots
3 cloves of garlic
250g of Fontina cheese
Salt, pepper & nutmeg (to-taste)

For the pasta dough:
550g of plain flour
4 whole eggs & 6 egg yolks
2 tbsp of good olive oil
Pinch of salt
Semolina for dusting

(Good fresh lasagne sheets can also be used as a short cut but if you have a pasta machine it’s nice to use it)

Method
Pasta:
• Combine all ingredients in a food mixer until the dough forms a ball • Rest in fridge for at least an hour • Roll by hand to a thickness of 3mm • Feed through a pasta machine dusting with semolina if necessary until you get to the second thinnest setting • Cut into squares of roughly the same size, approximately 10cm
• Blanche in boiling water for 3mins then refresh in iced water • Pat dry and coat lightly with olive oil, chill until required

Filling:
• Thinly slice the shallots and garlic and cook gently in olive oil until soft but not coloured • Add the spinach and cook until wilted • Cool quickly and use a sieve to squeeze out any excess water • Mix in the ricotta & chopped walnuts
• Grate in a little nutmeg and season with salt & pepper • Thinly slice the Fontina cheese

Assembly: • Place a pasta sheet on an oiled tray • Spread 3 tbsp of the spinach mix evenly over the pasta and top with a slice of Fontina • Repeat twice, (its nice to place the pasta sheets at different angles), bake for ten minutes • Serve with good Italian bread (we recommend fresh focaccia) and a salad of your choosing.

For an English twist ‘Rachel’ goats cheese, from the White Lake Cheese Co. in Somerset, makes an excellent alternative to Fontina.

Rosemarino is at 1 York Place, Bristol BS8 1AH.