So, a couple weeks ago, I decided to make pizza for my group of friends (tentatively called the scoobies hereafter, mainly due to the resemblance to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I’m Oz) in order to show them what true Regina pizza is like.
Whilst I was shopping for ingredients, I ran into a few snags. The veg was fine, mushrooms, peppers, pineapple, it’s all here. However, they don’t go overboard with 80 kinds of bbq sauce the we do in North America. This forced me to adjust my sauce recipe (calling Dr. Daniels, Dr. Jack Daniels). The bbq sauce I found is good, but it’s actually a bit too strongly flavoured to my liking for pizza sauce. It made an adequate replacement, and I’ll continue using it.
The real issue came when it was time to top the pizza. No Calabrese. No Cappocolo. While I have since found some Cap, I swear it’s impossible to find Calabrese in this city. So, I grabbed some German salami as a nice substitute.
Then to get some cheese. Provolone? Nope. Ok, how about Monterrey Jack? Nope. Alright, I guess I can use Mozzarella. Nope. What?! No Mozzarella? WTH? Seriously, who doesn’t have mozza? In the end, I ended up using a bag of pre shreaded, mixed swiss and mozzarella, that was obviously designed to top pizza and provide no flavour. As an aside, emmental is easy to get there, and my usual pizza cheese is half emmental and half provolone.
Since there were a ton of British cheese, of which I had never heard, available, I got down to business and started trying them out.
First off, 90% of the cheese isle in a UK supermarket is cheddars. Now, these are what I’ve always called real cheddar. White, very old, a little crumbly, strong sharp flavor. The kind of stuff Balderson’s makes. And it’s all good. I love the sharp cheddars they have, and I’m happy to see them offered cheaply and plentifully.
Now on to the other British cheeses. There are three major varieties (not including Stilton, which is famous enough that I knew what it was in advance.) They are, Double Gloucester, Cheshire, and Leicester. Leicester is a bright red color, all through, so I decided to hold of on trying it until I had a better handle on UK cheese. I bought a block each of Cheshire and Double Gloucester.
Double Glocester is essentially what at home they call Canadian Cheddar. Bright orange, smooth, not crumbly at all, cheddary flavour, but not quite as sharp as the real stuff. It would melt easily in a grilled cheese sandwich (processed cheese is for heretics) or on top of a burger. Good stuff, but nothing I haven’t had a billion times.
Cheshire, is a white cheese, that is very crumbly and tangy. If that sounds like feta to you, then you aren’t far off. Although not quite identical to feta, it is very similar. It’s a dryer cheese, however, and slightly milder. Honestly, I like it more, and just finished making some risotto with it.
So, in the end, I’ve found that the UK really is a lot like home. They have the same cheese here, they just call it by different names. Well except for the still missing Italian cheeses.
Filed under: London
