Cheese and wine, a match made in heaven? I had the pleasure of speaking  about cheesemaking at the Hurstville Wine Club monthly meeting recently.  Damian, Rhonda, Jeff and the team made me feel very welcome and it was great chatting to people who enjoyed tasting different wines and learning something new.

I covered the process of cheesemaking and then talked about wine and cheese pairing.   I recommend a common sense approach which would be used not only with wine but with any food being matched to cheese.  The stronger the cheese flavour, the more robust must be the matching wine (see the table at the end of this article).

I also demonstrated how to make ricotta (see my recipe here) and a sample of warm, freshly made cheese was sampled by the attendees.  It took just 20 minutes to make the cheese from start to finish, and I was fortunate to have help from the audience to stir the curd and spoon it into a basket.

Wine and Cheese Pairings

Types of Cheese	Examples	Wine Pairing
Fresh Cheese and Soft Cheese	Cottage cheese, Cream cheese, Ricotta, Mozzarella, Halloumi, Fetta Brie and Camembert	Crisp whites, Sparkling wines, Dry rose and Light reds
Semi Hard Cheese Hard Cheese (young)	Edam, Havarti Parmesan, Cheddar, Gouda	Fruity reds, Medium whites and vintage sparkling wines
Hard Aged Cheese	Aged Cheddar, Cheshire	Full bodied whites and tannic reds, also Sweeter fortified wines
Blue Cheese	Danish, Roquefort, Stilton	Robust wines with sweetness to balance the bold flavours, eg Muscat

Text and photos copyright: Sophia Poulos