Cooking Club Ingredient #2: Cheese

Dizzyblonde

This time the ingredient is cheese, in all its delicious glory. It's one of the most versatile ingredients, used in everything from Welsh rarebit to pizza - so let's be having your favourite cheesy production

How to join in:

Post your recipe below - in this thread - with pictures if you like. The pictures must be your own, though! Ideally, put your pictures after the complete ingredients list and method, for readability.

To maintain the spirit of the forum, please try someone else's recipe and give them feedback.

If you don't have a recipe to post, that's cool too! Feel free to try whichever recipes grab your fancy and don't forget to post with your feedback.

Dizzyblonde

Cheese and onions are a match made in heaven and I often make cheese & onion pie, then freeze it in portions for lunches and picnics.

Pastry:
120g/4oz butter, cut into small pieces
200g/7oz self-raising flour, plus extra for dusting
pinch of salt
cold water

Filling:
25g/1oz butter
3 onions, roughly sliced
freshly ground black pepper
250g/9oz cheese, coarsely grated. I use cheddar and if I have another cheese in the fridge I'll add some of that too.
150ml/5fl oz water
milk, for sealing and glazing

Rub the butter into the flour and salt, then add just enough cold water to bind it into a dough. Wrap it in clingfim and chill it in the fridge for 20 minutes.
Meanwhile make the filling. Melt the butter in a large pan and fry the onions gently for 10 minutes. Don't allow them to colour. Then add the water and ground pepper and turn up the heat. Cook until almost all the liquid has evaporated. Spread the onions on a plate to cool.
Grease a 2cm/8in tart tin or dish. Roll out just over half the pastry and line the tin/dish with it. Spread half the onions over the pastry, then half the cheese, then repeat. Brush the rim of the pastry with a little milk so it will seal. Roll out the rest of the pastry and cover the pie with it. Press around the edges with your thumb to seal the pie, then brush the top with milk. Make three small holes in the centre of the pastry for the steam to escape.
Bake in a preheated oven 180C for 40-50 minutes until golden. Allow to cool for about half an hour before cutting - it's best served warm or at room temperature.

Edit: I don't have a recent photo but here's one I posted in the Lunch thread some time ago:

Neyite

I adore cheese. I love it in all its forms with chilli jam or chutney. I put it on any salad I make. I put slabs of it on bread under the grill.

Two fave's in my house:

The Ultimate Cheese Toastie:
Get three slices of bread per person, grill one side until golden. Remove from grill, put slices of cheese on all three. Then, sliced onion and olives on top of one, ham /chorizo or chicken on another, sliced tomatoes on the last one.

Grill until cheese is all melty. Remove from the grill, layer them into a double decker sandwich with a dollop of coleslaw before you put the lid of the sandwich on.

Spinach & Feta Pie with Sticky Sausages:
This is a collaborative recipe with another boardsie. She shared the pie recipe, I shared the sausages one, and its usually on the menu whenever we meet up.

Sausages: use cocktail sausages or twist ordinary ones in the middle to half them. Add each of a dollop of honey, hoisin sauce, and wholegrain mustard to a bowl and toss the sausages in the mixture. Transfer to a baking dish.

Spinach & Feta Pie:
A few sheets of filo pastry
1 kg spinach, washed and slightly shredded
400g feta cheese, crumbled
1 egg, beaten
Salt pepper to taste
Nutmeg dash
2 Shallots, finely sliced
2 cloves garlic, chopped

Line a baking dish with a couple of sheets of filo pastry.
Combine all the other ingredients in a bowl and pour into your lined baking dish. Put next filo over top. Add a few more in waves/ gathers and brush with some beaten egg.

Put both in the oven at 180 for about an hour or until sausages are cooked and pastry is nice and golden.

Toto Wolfcastle

I found this recipe for parsnip mash with cheese and bacon in a magazine a few months ago and I've been making it regularly since.

Peel, chop and steam your parsnips until tender. Mash with some butter and milk until you have the consistency you like. Crisp up some streaky bacon, chop it up and add it to the mash along with some grated parmesan. (Add as much or as little as you like! I like mine with extra cheese!) Mix it all together and shovel the sweet, cheesy mash into your mouth.

I've also done it with mature cheddar and chorizo and it's really good.

pampootie

This is really simple but one of my favourite salads- warm roast chunks of butternut squash, toasted pine nuts, rocket and lots of crumbled feta with a balsamic/lemon/olive oil dressing. Nyom

Minder

Chicken Savoyarde. Time to resurrect this family favourite. This version is from Simon Hopkinson and Serves 4.

Ingredients

1 x 1.5kg free-range chicken
1 large onion, roughly sliced
1 large carrot, thickly sliced
2 sticks celery, thickly sliced
1 large leek, trimmed, thickly sliced and washed
2 bay leaves
2-3 sprigs thyme
3 cloves
1tsp salt

For the sauce, and to finish the dish
50g butter
40g flour
300ml stock from poaching the chicken
200ml dry white wine
200ml double cream
50g grated Gruyère cheese
3 tarragon sprigs, leaves chopped
1tsp Dijon mustard
Salt and pepper
2-3tbsp fine breadcrumbs mixed with 1tbsp freshly grated Parmesan

Method

Put the chicken in a large pot, add the vegetables, herbs, cloves and salt. Poach very gently for about an hour, skimming off any scum that settles on the surface. Once cooked, lift out the bird and allow to cool. Strain the stock through a fine sieve and discard all solids. Leave to settle and remove all surface fat. Remove all meat from the chicken carcass, then tear into large pieces. Pre-heat the oven to 200˚C/gas mark 6.

To make the sauce, melt the butter in a pan, stir in the flour and cook for a couple of minutes, stirring. Gradually add the chicken stock, white wine and cream and whisk together until thickened. Stir in the cheese and tarragon, correct the seasoning and simmer together for about 20 minutes. Only now should you stir in the mustard.

Put the chicken in a lightly buttered, shallow baking dish, pour the sauce over and loosely mix chicken and sauce together, then sprinkle with the breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese. Bake in the oven for 30-35 minutes until the dish is golden brown and bubbling well around the edges. Eat with crisp green leaves and buttered new potatoes.

convert

I love cheese, but for some reason I don't seem to use it in cooking very often, apart from a cheese sauce, probably because the OH hates the sight of cheese. As a result, I'm usually left to just enjoy it as a snack with crackers, or as part of a salad for lunches.

One of my favourite quick lunches to bring to work has feta cheese in it. It's very simple and quick to prepare.

Ingredients:
pasta
chicken (any type, but I prefer breast of chicken)
salad leaves
cherry tomatoes, chopped in half
green peppers, roughly chopped
sweet corn
spring onions, sliced at an angle
feta cheese, chopped into cubes
black olives
olive oil
salt and pepper to season

Method:
Cook pasta as per instructions
Season chicken lightly with salt and pepper and fry in an oiled pan until cooked
Remove pasta from heat, allow to cool and add a slug of olive oil and seasoning
Add chopped peppers, tomatoes, spring onions, sweet corn, olives, cheese, and chicken (chopped into pieces, if you like) and salad leaves
Stir together and serve (or put in lunchbox for work!)

Mrs Fox

I'm not a fan of blue cheese in it's actual form, but give me blue cheese dip or dressing anytime.
This is such a simple recipe for a light but fulfilling lunch.


Crunchy Greens with Blue Cheese Dressing

Gem lettuce, halved lengthways, OR Cos/Romaine cut in big chunks
Mix of baby tomatoes, halved

Dressing:
1/2 cup good blue cheese of your choice, chopped
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup double cream
2 tbsp tarragon vinegar if you can get it, or apple cider/white wine vinegar is ok
salt + pepper to taste


Blitz the cheese, mayonnaise, cream and vinegar in a food processor until smooth. Season to taste.

Place the lettuce on a plate with tomatoes on the side . Pour enough dressing over the lettuce. Serve immediately.

ameliams

Spinach and ricotta Frittata/Spanish Omlette

This is a variation of your standard frittata or Spanish omlette for those who like a bit of flavour.

5 eggs.
100g ricotta
Spinach
200g Potatoes
40g chorizo
1 tablespoon of harissa

Whisk 4 (not 5) the eggs with the ricotta.
Line the dish with the spinach.
Line the potatoes on top. I like to cut them into chip slices but anyway will work.
Add the chorizo sliced whichever way you fancy.
Now here I generally add the egg mixture.
Then I whisk the last egg with the harissa and add it into the dish.
Feta on top and in the oven for 15-30 depending on how you've sliced the potatoes.
Mine is a fan oven and I find it takes 20-25 at 200.

Minder

Mrs Fox wrote: »

I'm not a fan of blue cheese in it's actual form, but give me blue cheese dip or dressing anytime.
This is such a simple recipe for a light but fulfilling lunch.


Crunchy Greens with Blue Cheese Dressing

Gem lettuce, halved lengthways, OR Cos/Romaine cut in big chunks
Mix of baby tomatoes, halved

Dressing:
1/2 cup good blue cheese of your choice, chopped
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup double cream
2 tbsp tarragon vinegar if you can get it, or apple cider/white wine vinegar is ok
salt + pepper to taste


Blitz the cheese, mayonnaise, cream and vinegar in a food processor until smooth. Season to taste.

Place the lettuce on a plate with tomatoes on the side . Pour enough dressing over the lettuce. Serve immediately.

A little garlic in the mix and a big pile of celery sticks and you have the best accompaniment to buffalo wings its possible to get (barring beer!)

Faith

Beer + chicken wings + blue cheese dressing = heaven.

Jasnah

Take a halved pepper, remove the seeds, fill liberally with feta, sprinkle with herbes de Provence and grill until satisfied.