French flag.
You don't have to visit France to buy French cheese. Not any more. You can get it in London.
UK flag.
Everybody knows Madame Tussaud's in London but not everybody knows that a short walk around the corner is the perfect place for trying cheese. When my widespread family visits London they divert to La Fromagerie to try and buy cheeses and stop for coffee and cheese. La Fromagerie's caffe menu offers a cheese platter with crackers and grapes to have with your coffee.
On my last visit I tried two or three cheeses. I intend to try truffle cheese next time.
This cheese platter offered a mixture of cheeses from cows, goats and sheep.
You can walk into the temperature controlled cheese shop behind a sliding glass door. The cheese with the grey line through the middle is French cheese M o r b i e r. A soft cheese with a good, pleasing but not overpowering flavour. Like a mild brie.
In a coolbox you can carry your cheese home or even overseas. Do check what you are allowed to import. Australia and New Zealand are pretty fussy. Remember that phyloxera, a teeny beetle like creature, wiped and the French wine industry over a century ago when these nasty creatures attacked the vines. When planting in the UK you still have to buy most vines attached to a different stronger root stock.
Don't make yourself a sandwich from cheese and healthy salad and forget to eat it and end up accidentally importing it. Sniffer dogs in the USA and Australia will catch the scent.
Singapore flag.
Last time I was offered cut flowers at an airport (Heathrow in London) I said, "Sorry I'm flying to Singapore," but the seller told me, "You can take anything that's cut, just not anything with soil and roots."
Hm. Not worth the risk. Don't take the word of the seller. Don't rely on what you could do on your last trip. Check the latest regulations for any country where you are flying, or have a stopover. Meanwhile enjoy your cheese.
If you are invited to a wine and cheese party find out if the hosts want wine or cheese, or both.
La Fromagerie has three branches, the one I know well, in Marylebone (near Madame Tussauds which is in Baker Street, also near Sherlock Holmes Museum), as well as Highbury (where? you may recall the grouping of neighbourhoods Highbury and Islington) and Bloomsbury (over in the British Museum direction), as you can see from their website.
Do take a look at their website. I was initially disappointed that their cheesecake section is not cheesecakes. (Try a Jewish deli.) But instead La Fromagerie offers unusual cheese towers, made of stacked cheeses in assorted colours in descending sizes as you go higher. This could look good for a dinner party, anniversary dinner for two or many, a birthday or wedding.
Prices for their gift packs for cheese and Champagne and a cute single bottle carrier go up to around a thousand pounds sterling. Wow. If you've got that sort of money to spend, please invite me to dinner or come to say and bring me some goodies. If you have under ten pounds to spend and want an unusual gift for somebody else, or a treat to take home, or send home, they also do damson paste and truffle honey. That's different.
If you are having a party, or want a celebration dinner on arriving home, buy cheese flags or print your own and attach them to cocktail sticks.
La Fromagerie,
Moxon Street
London
England
UK
Useful Websites
https://www.lafromagerie.co.uk
singaporeair.com
visitbritain.com
https://fakingitfabulous.com/2019/05/05/free-printable-cheese-flags/
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author, speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.
No comments:
Post a Comment