What have you been eating this past week? I ask because January is always a sort of weird month when it comes to eating and drinking. Well, mostly eating. We’ve just come out of a season of indulgence of richness and comfort. In a second, from 11.59.59 p.m. on December 31st, we don’t just move from one day to another or a month but to a new calendar year, and with that comes various feelings and decisions about our diet. Meat and bread suddenly become enemies. We twist ourselves like pretzels, adjusting to self-imposed restrictions and deprivations as we try to figure things out.
Apart from the dietary resolutions, the palate is saturated with all the big bold flavours of the holidays and long for relief and lightness.
This past week, I’ve been eating a lot of fruit and cheese. I’ve not really been feeling hungry for food as in hot cooked food and I find that the combination of sweet and savoury that I get from fruits and cheese is very satisfying. I don’t believe that any of these combinations are new to you. Nevertheless, they can serve as reminders and prompts in case you are looking for things to snack on. If you are a cheese lover and have access to a variety of cheese – hard, soft, creamy, crumbly, sharp, mild, aged, stinky, fruity, smoked, sweet or salty – I would suggest that you shake things up and gave them a try, especially ones that you are not familiar with. You might be surprised at how well they pair with fruits or taste on their own. Of course, nothing beats a good aged or sharp cheddar.
A word of advice – when eating cheese, let it come up to room temperature to get the fullness of the flavour. Therefore, remove it from the refrigerator several minutes before use. The time will vary depending on your location. The fruits can be chilled or at room temperature and that is usually based on how best the fruits are to be stored. Sometimes it is nice to use a combination of chilled and room temperature ingredients.
Apples & Cheese – Choose a variety available to you that is sweet; Gala, Golden delicious, McIntosh, Fuji and Red delicious are among the varieties we get in these parts. A good quality blue cheese or creamy salty Havarti would pair well with any of these apples. And, as I have said before, an aged or sharp cheddar will too. We also get Granny Smith apples, so if you are looking for something extra firm with tartness, this will work fine. A salty cheese would complement this well.
Watermelon & Cheese – Feta with watermelon is a well-established combination. The salty crumble of feta is palate-pleasing with the cool sweet juiciness of watermelon. If there are other melons in season, definitely give them a try.
Pears & Cheese – I am not talking here about the local avocado pears, rather of the varieties such as Bartlett, Bosc and Concorde which we get here. Bartlett is my favourite; it is sweet, soft, and juicy. Bosc is sweet too and there is a spiciness to it. I like this pear because it is firm and crisp. I tend to use this variety most when I want to have fruit with cheese or add to a salad. The Bartlett I most often would eat on its own.
Grapes & Cheese – This is like my go-to fruit and cheese combo and most of the time I have grapes with Anchor cheddar cheese. The grapes are usually cold, so you get this rush and pop of sweet cool juice chasing the savoury cheese. So good.
Not sure what the upcoming week of eating is going to be like. I think it might be time for some dhal and rice and coconut chutney, and/or a hot curry! Options.
Have a great week everyone.
Cynthia
