OK, so it is Valentine’s Day. Exchanging gifts with Kevin is complicated because we are 5,000 miles apart, but if we were together it is fairly certain that food would be involved. Would it be chocolate, or is the way to my heart more surely navigated with cheese? Can you have both? Surely not, but then again…
Yes ladies, you can! Thanks to the good people at Culture magazine I present the definitive guide to pairing chocolate with cheese.
Of course Culture is an American magazine, so they are talking about American chocolate and cheeses. Fine those may be, if you know where to look, they are hard to get in the UK. What I need is an equivalent that uses Montezuma’s chocolate and British cheeses. Does such a guide exist? If not I guess I have a whole year to do the research.
Well, Hotel Chocolat do a cheese and chocolate tasting experience…
Oh, interesting! Thank you. 🙂
No chili involved though. I think there has to be chili involved somewhere.
I seem to recall Heston Blumenthal claiming that chocolate and blue cheese share a large number of taste components, so that may be something to work with.
You mentioned chili: I ate one of my precious store of Montezuma’s Revenge last night — sadly without cheese — but I will endeavour to assist in the research, though it is a little difficult to get Montezuma’s and cheese here. I do have two large wax-coated Maryland Farm mature cheddars in the fridge, where they have been maturing for a year and a half, so I’ll be opening one of them soon. The last time I did this (about four years ago — by accident) the result was spectacular. An already mature cheddar given an extra year or so.
If I hear of any of my UK friends traveling to Japan I will try to get them to take a care package of Montezuma’s chocolate with them.
That would be great. Though we will be in the UK in the summer (after the Olympics, of course).
I do strongly recommend the waxed cheddar I mentioned. It was actually the reason why, the last time we went to the UK, we flew into the ghastly Heathrow: because Caviar House in Duty Free sells it, and they don’t at Birmingham.