18 minute read
TASTING: CHEESE & WINE
With the pandemic reviving home entertainment, cheese and wine parties are back in vogue. So, Good Cheese decided to revisit and explore this classic combination. PATRICK McGUIGAN assembled a team of experts to taste their way through some of their favourite contemporary matches.
Photography by Sean Calitz
The nest of pairs
IT’S A MATCH that has stood the test of time, enjoyed by the Romans, Medieval lords and 1980s dinner party guests. And when the pandemic hit and lockdowns were introduced, people hit the bottle and cheeseboard in a big way.
With cheese and wine parties fashionable again, it made sense to take another look at how the two can work together – beyond the obvious established matches.
The tasting session started with a discussion about what makes the perfect pairing, and there were some surprising views.
“I’ve only had a handful of cheese and wine pairings in my life that have been outstanding,” admits cheese consultant Emma Young. “It’s harder than you think to get the perfect match.
“There are basic rules. Making sure there are similar levels of intensity is a good idea. So, a powerful Barolo with a fresh goats’ cheese is probably not going to work, but a sweet wine with lots of acidity and fruit avours will work with a fruity, boozy blue. It’s about matching complex with complex and simple with simple.”
Cheese and wine expert Francis Gimblett takes a similar view. “I tend to pooh-pooh a lot of matches,” he says. “Too much attention is paid to the match rather than allowing each to show its full potential. One must not kill the other.”
The key to success, according to WSET wine educator Julia Lambeth, is to nd a link between the two. “It’s about a bridging point of similar avours in the cheese and wine, but you also need to think about intensity and structure, and how acidity works with fat. Dry whites o en work because they cut through the creaminess of cheese.”
For cheesemonger Alan Watson, the aim of cheese and wine matching is to elevate both the cheese and wine. “If you get a good pairing then you nd something new and the conversation ows. One of the reasons I work in cheese is because complex avours get people talking.”
MEET THE PANEL
Julia Lambeth
Wine educator and student experience coordinator at the Wine and Spirit Education Trust’s London school.
Francis Gimblett
The owner of event business Taste of the Vine has hosted thousands of wine and cheese tastings. He is also the author of Gimblett’s Guide to the Best of British Cheese.
Patrick McGuigan
The cheese journalist chaired the discussion.
Emma Young
Well known as The Cheese Explorer on Instagram, cheese consultant Young has worked for Whole Foods Market UK, Mons Cheesemongers and Gringa Dairy.
Alan Watson
Head of cheese at The Cheese Bar restaurant and retail group, Watson previously worked for Paxton & Whitfield and La Fromagerie.
J. Lassalle, Brut, Rosé Champagne, Premier Cru, NV Reims, France 12% ABV, 85% Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Pinot Meunier Charles Arnaud Mont d’Or PDO Franche-Comté, France Raw cows’ milk, soft, washed rind
A salmon-pink Champagne with bright acidity and red berry notes matched with the famous spruce-wrapped, washed rind cheese from the Jura is first up, but fails to wow the panel.
“I like the wine and I like the cheese, but I’m not convinced they are doing enough for each other,” says Lambeth. “There are toasty notes in both, but I felt they were too separate.”
Gimblett adds that he feels the Mont d’Or is a little young. “The Champagne was lovely and ripe, so it might have worked if the cheese was riper.”
Young agrees: “It was all a bit too polite.”
Breaky Bottom, Brut, Cuvée, 2011 East Sussex, England 12%, Chardonnay, Seyval Blanc, Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier Golden Cross Sussex, England Raw goats’ milk, soft, mould/yeast-ripened
This is an all-Sussex match featuring a sparkling wine with brioche and apple notes, plus the young creamy Sainte-Maure-style Golden Cross.
“The wine really highlighted the cheese and emphasised the yoghurty notes,” says Watson. “I was also getting a lovely briny, mossy vibe from the match.”
Lambeth picks up on the briny, seaside flavour, too. “On the palate, the wine is savoury with an oyster shell character that really brought the match alive.”
Gimblett adds: “Golden Cross can be quite gooey, but that’s about as light and creamy as it gets. There was real elegance to this pairing.”
Casa Belfi Bianco Bio Frizzante (NV) Veneto, Italy 10.5%, Glera Stonebeck Yorkshire, England Raw cows’ milk, crumbly, cloth-bound Wensleydale
An organic ‘pet nat’, this lightly sparkling white wine has a cloudy appearance and notes of pear and citrus. It is matched with Stonebeck – a farmhouse Wensleydale that sends our panel into rhapsodies.
“I absolutely love this cheese,” says Watson. “It’s yoghurt, butter, wet grass and soil. You can taste it’s from a wet, windy farm, but I lost a lot of that with the wine.”
Young feels the same. “Incredible cheese, but they brought out a lot of acidity in each other. There were really interesting sage notes in the wine and pea notes in the cheese, but they were lost.”
Chateau Minuty, M de Minuty, Côtes de Provence Rosé, 2020 Provence, France 12.5%, Grenache, Cinsault, Syrah St Jude Suffolk, England Raw cows’ milk, soft, mould/yeast-ripened
This juicy rosé from the south of France, full of berry notes fails to stand up against the rich, farmy flavours of the St Jude. Lambeth is disappointed. “I was hoping this was going to be a wild card, but there are more differences than similarities.”
The rest of the panel agrees, noting that the cheese overpowers the simple wine. “This is the kind of easy drinker they call ‘glou-glou’ wine in France, but it brought out bitter notes in the cheese,” says Young.
“The St Jude had a lot to say,” says Gimblett. “And while the rosé was clean and well made, there wasn’t enough complexity.”
I’ve only had a handful of cheese and wine pairings in my life that have been outstanding. It’s harder than you think to get the perfect match.”
Arndorfer Hand Crafted Riesling, 2019 Kamptal, Austria 12%, Riesling Baron Bigod Suffolk, England Raw cows’ milk, soft, mould ripened
Would a rich, aromatic Riesling from Austria match up to Britain’s best Brie? The answer sadly is no. Our panel feels the cheese is too young, with a chalky, tangy core that clashes with the richness and floral notes of the wine.
“The Riesling has acidity that cuts through the fattiness,” says Lambeth. “It works really well with the gooey layer beneath the rind, but not so much with the heart of the cheese.”
Watson agrees: “I found the chalky core brought out the alcohol in the Riesling. Whereas the cabbage notes near the rind worked much better with the wine. I would really like to try this with a fully ripe Bigod.”
Château Guiraud ‘G de Guiraud’ 2019, Bordeaux Blanc Bordeaux, France 14%, Organic Semillon and Sauvignon Blanc Onetik Ossau Iraty PDO Pyrénées, France Raw sheep’s milk, hard
An intense Ossau needs a wine that can keep pace with it, and this rich, oak-aged 50/50 Semillon and Sauvignon Blanc Bordeaux is up to the job. “There’s complementary nuttiness in both the cheese and the wine,” says Lambeth. “There’s plenty of texture from the Semillon and the oak to stand up to the cheese. It’s a food wine, and the cheese proves it.”
“The cheese is very elevated in salt with lots of butterscotch and marmite notes, and the wine is very aromatic” declares Young. “I was initially sceptical, but I’ve gone back several times and it works.”
Francis Gimblett
Fattoria de Vaira, Vincenzo Bianco, 2019 Molise, Italy 11%, Organic Falanghina and Trebbiano Baronet Wiltshire, England Pasteurised cows’ milk, soft, washed rind
This match – of a rich, Reblochon-style washed rind from Wiltshire and an Italian biodynamic orange wine – provokes a lot of discussion among our experts. Gimblett is a fan of both, but not necessarily together. “Baronet is lovely – ripe, creamy and peanutty – and the wine is quite forthright, but they are not improving each other.”
Emma Young is more positive. “They are quite a funky couple. It’s a pleasant pairing without it being the best. I was looking for a bit more.”
JP Brun, Domaine des Terres Dorees, Morgon, 2018 Beaujolais, France 12%, Gamay Arrigoni Taleggio PDO Bergamo, Italy Raw cows’ milk, soft, washed rind
A choice which splits the room, this match pitches the red fruit flavours of Beaujolais with raw milk Taleggio.
“It was like reading a great novel in the middle of an opera – hard to appreciate both at the same time,” says Gimblett, arguing that the cheese is too much for the wine.
But Watson and Young disagree. “I thought the flavours came back at each other in waves,” says Young.
Kanonkop, Kadette Pinotage, 2019 Stellenbosch, South Africa 14%, Pinotage Smoked Quickes Cheddar
Devon, England
Pasteurised cows’ milk, hard, cloth-bound, smoked
A crowd pleaser. Most of the panel agree that this match works on paper, and it delivers in reality. The smokey notes of the Pinotage dovetail nicely with the smoked cheddar in an, but there is a sense that it is too simple. “There’s a jamminess from the wine, which contrasts with the oak chip, tobacco smokiness,” says Lambeth. “It’s not sophisticated, but it works.” Gimblett likes the way the big flavours of both cheese and wine don’t crowd each other, while Young also likes the pairing, but feels it was too simple.
Skaramuča Dingač, 2015 Pelješac, Croatia 15%, Plavac Mali Corra Linn Lanarkshire, Scotland
Raw sheep’s milk, hard, cloth-bound In Croatia, they drink this dark, tannic red with the aged sheep’s milk cheese Pag, but the panel decided to go with a similar hard, Scottish cheddar-style cheese made with raw sheep’s milk. The roast dinner, lamb-fat flavours coming through in the cheese are deliciously savoury, but at 15% ABV the wine is just a little too powerful. “We are losing some of the elegance of the cheese – the alcohol is just too much,” says Gimblett. Young adds: “They’re dancing next to each other but not together. It’s a bit of a line dance. Not a tango.”
Vin Jaune, Domaine Badoz 2013 Côtes du Jura, France 14%, Savagnin Vagne Comté Franche-Comté, France Raw cows’ milk, hard cooked
A sweet, nutty Comté from the Jura and a Vin Jaune made in the same region, which had nutty, sherry-like tones, get the judges excited. “I’m not always convinced about terroir pairings,” says Young. “I tried not to like it, but I loved it. A lovely mix of flavours - cereal, walnut, cake, grass.” Lambeth is also a fan.
“I loved everything about it.
“The wine has nuttiness, honey, caramel notes, which you can pick up in the cheese.”
Carole Bouquet, Sangue d’Oro, Passito di Pantelleria, 2014 Sicily, Italy 14.5%, Muscat of Alexandria Persille du Beuajolais Rhone Alps, France Pasteurised cows’ milk, semi-soft blue
Our panel saved the best until last. A lush, figgy dessert wine from Sicily, made with dried Muscat of Alexandria grapes, proves to be the perfect foil for a sweet and salty French blue. Watson is particularly taken with the match. “There’s a beautiful malty, treacle flavour from the wine and a kind of ginger cake finish with the cheese. There’s also a slight farmyard note from the blue, which I really liked.”
Alan Watson, The Cheese Bar
AND HERE’S THE TOP FIVE MATCHES…
1. Passito di Pantelleria & Persille
du Beuajolais
2. Breaky Bottom sparkling wine &
Golden Cross
3. Vin Jaune & Comté
Beneath the rind of Castile and León
This region in Spain’s north west is home to several well-known protected cheeses, but dig a little deeper and there are other innovative and unique cheeses to discover
ASK A BRITISH CHEESEMONGER to name a cheese from Castile and León and they are likely to mention Valdeón, Zamorano or Castellano. The traditional cheeses, which are protected under EU law, have built a global reputation over many years, but there’s plenty more to discover in the region’s dairies.
Tucked away among its mountains, valleys and plateaus are numerous innovative cheesemakers that have created award winning products that capture the terroir and history of Castile and León.
Queserías del Tiétar in the south of the region is a good example. Based in La Adrada.in the mountainous Ávila province, the company was rst set up by Rafael Báez in 1983 as a retirement hobby a er a career in the automative industry in Madrid. The hobby soon became a passion and then a hugely successful business thanks to cheeses, such as the so , oval log-shaped Monte Enebro (‘mule’s leg’).
“Queserias del Tiétar is located on the southern slopes of the Gredos’ mountains in the Tiétar Valley, surrounded by nature - huge pine forests that we can almost reach with our hands, gorges and crystal-clear streams,” says Baez’s daughter Paloma, who runs the business today with her sister and brother. “The milk is sourced from dairy farmers located within a 50km radius from our dairy.”
The company was one of the pioneers of artisan cheese in Spain in the 1980s, leading the way for a renaissance in small-scale production that continues today in Castile and León. “The number of small producers has increased lately and nowadays there are more professionals supporting high quality produce and following their own cheese tradition from the region they are from,” says Báez. “Farmers have taken advantage of the milk their animals produce in order to get added value from it, processing it into cheese, as the milk market is quite unstable.”
It’s not just goats’ milk that Castile and León’s cheesemakers are turning into innovative new products. In Coreses in the Zamora province, the Moralejo brothers, Jose Luis and Juan Angel, saw there was huge potential for sheep’s cheeses. The pair had come from the meat sector, selling lamb across Spain, but in 2006 decided to take a di erent direction, rearing sheep for milk rather than the table. Today their company, Baltasar Moralejo e Hijos, has a 4,000 strong ock of Assaf breed sheep and makes around 350 tonnes of cheese a year under the Pagos Los Vivales brand. The hard cheeses, which are made with raw milk, come in a range of di erent age pro les from the 15-day-old Tierno to Gran Reserva aged for 16 months.
The most famous hard sheep’s milk cheese made in Spain is undeniably Manchego, but Moralejo’s cheeses o er something di erent, according to the company’s commercial manager Jorge Álvarez.
“Our cheese is more personal, we can say that it is more artisan,” he says. “It is a raw milk cheese, which gives it properties, textures, aromas and avours that are much more intense and speci c. Another advantage is that, by using only milk from our own livestock, we control the entire process, so the cheese has a frankly remarkable homogeneity throughout the year.” Quesería Valdecabras is another example of the new wave of cheesemakers in Castile and León that are pushing the boundaries of Spanish cheese. Set up in 2008 by Begoña Chozas, who was joined by her brother and sister, the family business does not make PDO or PGI-protected cheeses.
Instead, it uses the goats’ milk produced in the Sierra de Gredos mountains in Ávila, where
the company is based, to make innovative cheeses that have gained international recognition. Cheeses such as the hard, raw milk Cured Valdecabras, which is aged for at least two months, and the so , ash-coated goats’ cheese Miss Capra, which is made in unusual 350g ingot-shaped blocks. Both cheeses have been recognised with prestigious Super Golds at the World Cheese Awards in recent years.
“While sheep-rearing is particularly strong in the region of Castile and León, the Ávila area has long been committed to rearing goats, given its geography, along with a climate of relatively gentle winters and hot summers,” says Chozas. “In the area of the Gredos mountains, the goat’s milk has always been used to make cheese. Mostly, fresh cheese that was sold locally and, to some extent, in Madrid as well.”
Historically, local goat farmers would make cheese on their mountain farms and bring them down by mule to village markets in the valleys. Today, Valdecabras (which means ‘valley of goats’) works with nine local farms, producing around 80 tonnes of cheese a year, which is sold in Spain, France and the UK. London deli group Bayley & Sage will stock its cheeses from this autumn and Chozas is optimistic for further growth in the future. “We are of the view that it has considerable scope for further development,” she says. Another company taking cheese in di erent directions is Cañarejal near Valladolid, which was founded in 1996 by the Santos family, who wanted to add value to the sheep’s milk produced on their farm. The company makes a range of hard cheeses, aged for various lengths of time, but has also developed interesting so cheeses such as Mantecoso – a semi-so , mould-ripened sheep’s milk cheese.
“Our dairy is next to the farm in Pollos within the Riberas de Castronuño Natural Reserve,” explains Nuria Alonso López from Cañarejal. “Our products are special because we control the feeding of our sheep and we make the cheese with fresh milk. All the elaboration and maturation is done manually.”
One of the company’s most innovative and successful products in the UK is Cremoso, an unusual torta-style cheese made with thistle rennet and a white mould rind, which has a remarkable runny texture. The cheese has just been listed by Paxton & Whit eld for its Christmas selection with customers encouraged to slice o the top and dip breadsticks, vegetables or even fruit into the gooey interior.
It just goes to show that if you dig beneath the rind, you’ll nd the cheeses of Castile and León are full of surprises.
WHERE TO BUY THE CHEESES OF CASTILE AND LEÓN IN THE UK
Sabor Zamarano, London
www.saborzamorano.co.uk
Brindisa, London
www.brindisa.com
Basco Fine Foods, Yorkshire www.bascofinefoods.com
Products From Spain, London
www.productsfromspain.co.uk
Paxton & Whitfield, Gloucestershire
www.paxtonandwhitfield.co.uk
Bayley & Sage, London www.bayley-sage.co.uk
www.queseriavaldecabras.com www.queseriasdeltietar.com www.pagolosvivales.com www.canarejal.es For more information, contact: ice@jcyl.es
THREE OTHER CHEESEMAKERS TO DISCOVER
Quesería La Antigua
Set up in 2002 in Fuentesaúco, Zamora, Quesería La Antigua makes and sells Zamorano, but has also developed a wide selection of flavoured sheep’s milk cheeses under the La Antigua brand. The range includes hard cheeses aged in lardo, wine or anise and chia seeds, plus jarred cheeses, flavoured with saffron and truffle, and even a soft cheese infused with chocolate.
www.queserialaantigua.com Quesos El Pastor
A large cheesemaker based in Polvorosa, Zamora, El Pastor makes Valdeón, Zamorano and Castellano, plus a huge range of other cheeses besides. Its hard, mixed milk cheeses, made with cow, sheep and goat’s milk, have picked up several medals at the World Cheese Awards, as has its Delicas de Cabra – a semi soft goat’s cheese, which is lactic and creamy.
www.elpastor.com Quesos Revilla
Another sizeable cheesemaker based in Coreses, Zamora, Revilla has developed range of hard cheeses made with goat or sheep’s milk, plus mixed milk varieties under the Torrecampos brand. It’s Gran Reserva Iberico cheese, made with raw cow, sheep and goat’s milk and aged for at least five months, was awarded a gold medal at the World Cheese Awards in 2018.
