Simple Pleasures 1: Cheddar & Tart Apples
Funny thing on this blog, there are two types of posts that get lots and lots of attention: extremely complex pastries like Opera cake, and extremely simple preparations like vanilla pudding. Lately I’ve thought it might be fun to create a new category of one-off posts covering very simplest of sweet and after-dinner pleasures, so simple in fact that no preparation might be needed at all.
The apple conversation this week got me thinking about this, a classic old-timey combo, one of my late grandfather’s favorite autumn snacks: Cheddar cheese and Granny Smith apples. The sharper the cheese… and the tarter the apple the better he liked it. Of course he wasn’t along in his love for the combo. Lots of folks, especially in rural areas here in the Midwest, used to favor a slab of sharp Cheddar alongside a nice piece of hot apple pie.
I used to think that was crazy. Then I tried it. I’ll never go back to ice cream!
I was working in a hotel banquet operation the first time I saw apple pie with cheddar (it is an easy way to do desert for 500, no way ice cream would work unless you had 100 servers) it struck me as odd until I tasted it. Also grapes with feta and a bit of brown sugar, works with cream cheese or sour cream too in a pinch.
Mom used to make little 2-bite deserts for parties, one I remember was broiled figs with a thin slice of parmesan on it. It amazed me how well those two went together.
That’s a simple pleasure that I’ll put up soon. Fresh figs or dried?
– Joe
My folks brought the custom of cheddar and apple pie from New Jersey to California in the 1940s! I still prefer it that way.
And you’ve been the beneficiary ever since! So it’s a West Coast thing as well. Who knew?
Cheers,
– Joe
It’s not just the midwest – I was raised in Alaska, and my dad used to “lift the hood” of his slice of hot apple pie, slide in a few thin slices of cheddar, and let it melt before he’d eat it.
Alaska?? Wow. And yeah i’ve seen that too. I watched my uncle do it once. I’ve never tried that but I will!
Cheers,
– Joe
I always thought it was a Yankee thing, very New England.
Interesting. And here I thought it was a Midwestern thing. Thanks Cath!
– Joe