13 of the world's cheesiest cuisines
21.07.2023 - 07:55
/ roughguides.com
Real lovers of cheese aren’t satisfied with a dusting of parmigiano. These thirteen dishes showcase the world’s best cheeses in truly lavish proportions. So if your heart is gladdened by gruyère or you say “halleluiah” at halloumi, loosen your belt for these wicked ways with cheese...
What started as a ruse to use up leftover bread and cheese is now a button-popping highlight of any trip to Switzerland. Today’s recipes bubble gruyère, garlic and lashings of white wine in a caquelon (communal dish). Cubed day-old bread is twirled in the stringy mixture using long-stemmed forks. Fondues are usually accompanied by crisp crudités – and half-hearted promises to burn the calories on a hike in the Jura.
© desiGNagy/Shutterstock
So you think Chinese food is light on dairy? Not so: mountainous Yunnan produces an unctuous goat's cheese, rubing. This meaty-textured cheese is served chargrilled in huge slices, accompanied with sugar for dipping, or sizzled with vegetables. If you can’t nibble it in its region of origin, Beijing’s Little Yunnan (28 Donghuangchenggen Beijie) sears some of the best.
Hearty cuisine is essential in the raw wilderness of the Carpathian Mountains in Romania and few dishes ensure your survival in these fog-draped peaks quite like mămăligă cu branza – a porridge of cornmeal layered with rich sheep's cheese. The best eateries will drown your polenta in the good stuff; Laci Csarda in Târgu-Mures is especially generous.
Wondering about the freshly-baked fragrance that floats out from Tbilisi's eateries? Follow your nose to the khachapuri, an oval-shaped loaf baked around a pool of melted cheese and topped with an egg. Think of it as Georgian pizza, with the emphasis on excellent puffy dough and ample cheese (usually salty local sulguni).
Khachapuri with egg and cheese. Georgian traditional cuisine @ Shutterstock
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Need your cheese with a bit more kick? Mexican cheese aficionados whip up a sauce of chorizo, chillies and onions to accompany a rich bowl of melted cheese. The finishing touch is a flambé, where tequila or rum is poured onto the cheese and lit. Only then is it combined with the spicy sauce and scooped greedily onto tortillas.
It would be an injustice to France's most famous soft, rinded cheese to nibble a small wedge. Make it the centrepiece of your meal by having it baked. Sometimes it'll be crumbed, sometimes simply drizzled with olive oil and speared by a sprig of thyme. What's guaranteed is a steaming round of cheese, just waiting to be punctured by a hunk of baguette.
@ Shutterstock
Don't let the word 'salad' fool you. Huge door-wedge-sized chunks of this sheep's cheese, sprinkled with oregano, are the salty showpiece for a medley of tomato, onion, cucumber and olives.