The Cheesemaker of Auld Lochnagar

This last weekend I was at the Cheese & Wine Festival on London's Southbank, giving a talk on cheese and wine matching with Rhuaridh Buchanan of Paxton & Whitfield.

One of the cheeses we tasted was a cheddar-style cheese called Auld Lochnagar and Rhuaridh had brought the impressively kilted cheesemaker, Alex Reid of Cambus O'May (above) along to his stand.

It turned out that he had been in the oil business but had decided to revive the family cheesemaking tradition with a recipe from his grandmother that hadn't been used since the 70s.

His principle cheese is an unpasteurised cheddar-style cheese called Cambus O'May which is made from the curds from an evening and morning milking in the old farmhouse style. You can just about see the variation in the colour, below.


It's clean, mellow and well-balanced - not as sharp as a cheddar but with a real depth of flavour.

The deep orange Auld Lochnagar, which is coloured with annato (see back of the main picture), is aged for longer and has more 'bite' though again not as pronounced as a mature farmhouse cheddar. It's therefore rather kinder to wine - I paired it successfully with an organic Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon from Vintage Roots - and, according to Alex, a good match for a Speyside whisky!

The creamery is based in Ballater on Royal Deeside and the cheeses are widely stocked throughout Scotland. You can also buy them online from the Virtual Farmers' Market as well as at Paxton & Whitfield.

Mac’n’cheese challenge: best use of artisanal cheese

While it’s always fun to invent a new recipe I thought it would be good to have a category which encouraged you all to use British artisanal cheeses. There was of course some overlap - some of you mentioned specific cheeses in your entries for best original recipe - and some made good use of cheeses outside the UK but you have to draw the line somewhere.

Interestingly Neal’s Yard proved to be the favourite place to source your cheeses and Montgomery's Cheddar the most frequently featured cheese:


Donna D combined it with Mrs Kirkham’s Lancashire in her blog My Fitness Year. (Not that mac'n'cheese immediately strikes you as part of a healthy eating regime but as Donna says, moderation in all things!)

Ms MarmiteLover offers the alternative of Green's of Glastonbury cheddar or Montgomery for her classic version which she says is "perfect for sitting in front of the telly watching something a bit crap like 'I'm a celebrity' or 'Big Brother'. It's great duvet food."


Sig of Scandilicious combined Montgomery with Wensleydale, Gorwydd Caerphilly and Stichelton in her ingenious version (above) which employed crème fraîche rather than having to make a cheese sauce. (Nice pix of the individual cheeses too.)


Sharmila of Sharmila on Food opted for Montgomery’s Cheddar, Ogleshield and Isle of Mull Cheddar for what she said "resulted in the most wondrous cheese sauce", capped by a few drops of white truffle oil.


And Scott of Scott Can Cook seems to have single-handedly kept Neal's Yard in business with his researches into different cheeses - again ending up with a Mac and Montgomery cheddar version.


In fact James of The Cotswold Food Year was the only one not to use Montgomery coming up instead with his wickedly indulgent Truffled Macaroni Bries. (Before you oject, as I did, he points out that he did in fact use St. Eadburgh, a Camembert-style cheese from Gorsehill Abbey Farm. He just liked the play on words of Macaroni Bries ;-)

This category will be judged by Jess Trethowan of Trethowans Dairy who are donating a gift box of artisanal cheeses to the winner.

Keen's crumpet #fail

When I was at Dean Street Townhouse earlier this week I spotted that they had Keen's crumpets with picalilli on their High Tea menu. As it was dinner time and I was reviewing the restaurant I didn't take advantage but it certainly sounded good. But what would it taste like?

I had a stab at home which I have to say wasn't a raging success. I toasted the crumpets lightly on both sides then buttered the upper side and toasted it again so the crumpet wouldn't go soggy. I piled it up with grated Keen's cheddar and melted it on the top rack of the Aga (not the best way to toast anything quickly but the only available option). Then I spooned a dollop of picalilli on the top as you can see above.

It was - how shall I put this? - underwhelming. Even having toasted the crumpet beforehand it was too soft and the picalilli - a rather posh brand called Mrs Bridges - not nearly mustardy enough and too sweet.

Thwarted, I tried them with Marmite (thinly spread, topped with cheese) which was better and with Colman's English mustard, a considerable improvement but there was still a 'What's the point?' element to the whole exercise. Good toast (we buy sourdough) would have been a much better base for all three.

Maybe the DST has some secret recipe for the cheese topping. Or maybe they make it as a rarebit but if I were you I wouldn't bother. Try the very tasty twice-baked haddock soufflés, which I imagine include at least a smidge of Parmesan instead.

New discovery: Winterdale Shaw

Finding a new English cheese is always a bit of a thrill especially when it has as resounding a name as Winterdale Shaw. I discovered it in that bastion of Britishness, Fortnum & Mason, whose trading director, Simon Burdess, was enthusing about it.

According to the Winterdale website it comes from a farm near Sevenoaks in Kent and is an unpasteurised, handmade, clothbound cheese similar to a cheddar. It's aged for around six months (I personally think it would benefit from being aged a bit longer) and is attractively rich, tangy and buttery.

Apparently it's been made since 2006 (so it's not that new) and has already picked up a couple of medals at the World Cheese Awards. Perfect for a ploughman's or a good old-fashioned macaroni cheese.

Hafod (aka Glamorgan) sausages

Glamorgan sausages - for this is what they are - are not sausages at all but little sausage-shaped croquettes made of cheese. I remember making them years ago from a Delia recipe and as I had some leftover bread and a tail end of cheese to use up decided to give them a go. Delia may well have got the recipe from Jane Grigson's English Food because that is who Simon Hopkinson acknowledges in this version which is what I based my recipe on, using Hafod organic cheddar rather than the Caerphilly or Lancashire he suggests.

Serves 2-3
1/2 small onion or half a bunch of spring onions, trimmed and finely sliced
150g grated Cheddar, Lancashire or Caerphilly (slightly less if using very strong cheddar)
100g fresh white breadcrumbs + about 25g extra for coating
2 large eggs
2 tbsp fresh parsley or a mixture of parsley and chives
1 level tsp English or Dijon mustard
salt and white pepper
Vegetable oil for frying
Tomato or apple chutney for serving.

Coarsely grate the onion, squeeze to get rid of the moisture and mix with the cheese and breadcrumbs. Separate the eggs and add the yolks, parsley (and chives if using) mustard and seasoning to the breadcrumb mix with just enough of the egg white to enable you to press the mixture together. Take dessertspoons of the mixture and form into small 'sausages' or croquettes.. Lightly whisk the remaining egg white, dip each 'sausage' into it and coat it in the remaining breadcrumbs.


Heat about a centimetre of oil in a frying pan and fry the sausages over a moderate heat, turning them until crisp and golden. Drain on kitchen paper and serve with tomato or apple chutney.


* the proportions will rather depend on how dry/absorbent your breadcrumbs and cheese are. I actually used less cheese as I only had 110g but felt it would have benefited from at least 25g more so I've stuck to Simon's original quantity in the recipe.

Another discovery and a bargain

While I was in Paxton & Whitfield checking out Blue Monday I discovered another fascinating cheese I'd never heard of before called Terschelling Schapenkaas. It's an organic, Gouda-style sheeps' milk cheese from the island of Terschelling in the far north of Holland.

Despite being only four months old it has a beautifully smooth texture and full nutty, tangy flavour - much mellower than many sheeps' cheeses. I discovered it was imported by a company called Boerenkaas which is run by a guy called Chris Macfarlane who used to work for Neal's Yard. You can also buy it direct from their stall in Borough Market on Fridays and Saturdays, for £28 a kilo which isn't cheap but well worth it in my opinion. (Apparently you only get 2 litres of milk a day out of these sheep!)

The bargain was a great hunk of Montgomery's cheddar P & W was selling off as cooking cheese from a truckle that had gone slightly over and started to blue but which still had a fantastic flavour. That was just £2.79 for 455g! I can see that there will be a weekend of toasted cheese coming up . . .

A fantastic new cheddar

I spent a day meandering around at the Organic Food Festival on Saturday where I was tipped off by a fellow food writer about a young couple who were making cheddar from Ayrshire cows on a farm in West Wales.

Didn't sound massively exciting - how many cheddars are there in the world for goodness sake - but as I trust his judgment I tracked them down.

What a cheese! It was full of flavour but incredibly pure tasting with none of the funky flavours you can get in artisanal cheddars like Keens and just a hint of that deliciously crystalline texture you get in an aged parmesan.

The cheesemakers, Sam and Rachel Holden, admittedly have an impeccable foodie pedigree. The organic farm on which they're making it is managed by Sam's father Patrick, director of the Soil Association. But that doesn't make it any less of an achievement

Apparently Randolph Hodgson, buyer for Neal's Yard Dairy (and brains behind the fabulous Stichelton - of which more later) was so impressed that despite the fact he initially told Sam Neal's Yard didn't need any more cheddars they're taking it on.

Look out for it. It's called Hafod and I predict it's a star of the future.