TARFU: The 10 Best British cheeses
1. Stichelton
A very popular, award-winning blue cheese produced on the Welbeck Estate in Nottinghamshire. Made from unpasteurised organic cow's milk and traditional animal rennet, it tastes cool and creamy with a slight tingle from the blue mould.
2. Keen's cheddar
Made from unpasteurised milk from the farm's own cows, this cheddar is pressed and bathed for three days and matured for up to a year. Traditional cheese-making at its best.
3. Stinking Bishop
Produced by Charles Martell & Son, this sticky, medium-soft cheese, which was originally made by monks, is mild and scoffable. The rind is washed in perry, which is what gives it its smell, but you can rest assured it's not as stinky as you'd imagine.
4. Colston Bassett stilton
Made by a dairy that has only once stopped producing stilton: during the Second World War (production was briefly switched to cheddar). This is a fine stilton that has all the features you would want: rich and creamy with a deep and tantalising flavour.
5. Innes Log
Soft, white, creamy and light, with a subtle nuttiness, this is simply one of the best goat's cheeses you will find. Produced at the Innes farm in Staffordshire, the handmade cheese has won praise from foodies and chefs alike.
6. Wensleydale blue
Wallace and Gromit certainly loved a slice of wensleydale and odds are they'd adore this blue variety even more. With a flavour more subtle and less overpowering than a traditional stilton, it is the blue cheese everyone and anyone can enjoy. The Supreme Champion at the British Cheese Awards 2012 – and deservedly so.
7. Blacksticks Blue
A multi-award-winning cheese from Lancashire, this has quite rightly been described as the "daddy of blue cheeses". It is very creamy, with a delicious texture, and is soft enough to smear on to a slice of bread or cracker. Perfect for cooking, it's popular with chefs and very popular with us here, too.
8. Connage Dunlop
A nutty, golden and mature Scottish hard cheese that comes from a Highland family farm that prides itself in its traditional organic methods of production. Eat it on its own or complement it with a rich wine or some plum chutney.
9. Cornish yarg
Named after the couple who first handmade this Cornish cheese in the 1970s (it is their surname, Gray, spelt backwards), this is a beautiful example of British artisan cheese. Wrapped in nettle or garlic leaves, the hard, tangy-tasting cheese has been the recipient of a shelf-full of awards.
10. Wigmore
Named after the cheesemakers themselves, this soft, brie-style cheese is smooth as a kiss and very subtle. Made with unpasteurised ewes' milk and perfectly matured for six weeks, it is the winner of more than a dozen awards.
Maybe snowkatt was right all along. :P