Cooking with cheese - go basic or take it up a notch?

Is there anything better than melted cheese?

My approach to cooking with cheese is the same as wine. I probably consume just as much as I use to cook with (that's allowed right?) but also I don't just go for the cheapest cheese or bottle of plonk I can find. I used to, thinking it was a waste to use in cooking but the older and wiser (debatable I know) I have got, I now know the difference having a decent bottle of wine or cheese to cook with makes on the end result.

Mayfield cheese on a croissant is a game changer! This isn't Mayfield (it never lasts long enough to get a picture in my house!) but you get the idea...

My dad used to call basic white cheddar (we all know the stuff) 'cooking cheese' - he'd use it for sauces, on top of a cottage pie or lasagne and on toast. Then there was the 'sandwich cheese' he just used for his sarnies. He grew up in Tottenham just after the Second World War so there was still rationing and you used what you could get your hands on.

We are so fortunate nowadays to have access to such a wide variety of cheeses. Have I mentioned there are more than 800 made in Britain alone? It's still a number that staggers me, and most people I share it with. And with so many on our doorstep, we can definitely do better than cooking with 'basic cheddar'. Of course if that's your preference that's absolutely fine and don't get me wrong, in our house we do love a good slab of standard supermarket cheddar every now and then. But being the cheese head I am, and having spoilt mine and my family's tastebuds in recent years with the journey I have been on, I love experimenting with using different cheeses in cooking.

If I use cheap cheese to cook with I find I need twice as much to get the depth of flavour I'm after.

For me now it's about getting the right balance and flavour. Some of my favourites include a strong salty cheddar or Lancashire on top of a pie, a creamy Stilton in a white sauce and for my cheese toasties a solid Red Leicester works really well.

I love a mozzarella-style cheese on a lasagne and we have so many British versions to choose from!

I find that if I use cheap cheese to cook with I need to use twice as much to get any depth of flavour whereas going for something stronger I really notice the difference. It's also about appreciating the craft that has gone into making the particular cheese I'm using too. I absolutely love cooking; in a previous life I was a chef, and so I like to take care in what I'm doing and that starts with the ingredients. Knowing that the cheese I'm using has been lovingly made by a small independent dairy makes me appreciate it so much more, and therefore appreciate the meal I'm making so much more.

One of my favourite cheese to cook with is Mayfield - an award-winning English Emmental made by the amazing Alsop & Walker. Its sweet tones and earthiness coupled with a great texture makes it especially lovely on a jacket potato or melted into a croissant with a dollop of strawberry jam. It's also great to use in homemade pesto.

The charcoal cheddar is probably our most popular cheeses and it's great crumbled into pasta and on top of a lasagne - the colour certainly gets people talking too!

And if it's mozzarella style you're after, we've got a delicious Scottish buffalo mozzarella at The Cheese Place (which we're using on the cheeseboards for February). It's from Scotland's first and only producer of Buffalo Mozzarella, made with milk from their herd of Water Buffalo in Fife!

I'd love to hear about your favourite cheese recipes and the cheeses you love using in cooking too. You may have guessed we eat a lot of cheese at home; it's fair to say it features in 90% of our meals, so we're always on the lookout for more cheesy recipes!