CHEESE

Reasons to eat cheese:

1. Other foods with holes in (doughnuts and polo-mints for example) are not as nice with wine and crackers.
2. It comes in a variety of colours.
3. The moon is made of cheese (no really, it is).
4. Cheeses have beautiful names: Dolce Latte, Gorgonzola, Port Salut, Stilton (such a good word, say it with me..’Stilton.’ See?), Gruyere, Roquefort, Brie, Camembert, Ricotta, Mozzerella, Mascarpone, Caerphilly etc..etc...
5. It’s the only mouldy food it is acceptable to have in your fridge.
6. Buying cheese can be a wonderful experience: cheese shops are lovely, smell fantastic and often sell other exciting foody things.
7. Cheese paraphenalia, such as cheese knives, cheeseboards and cheese-cutters are nice weighty items for your kitchen.
8. Because it has a double vowel, “cheese” is a very satisfying word to say, and can be elongated at will.
9. Cheese is a prominent prefix in the dictionary: cheeseboard, cheesecake, cheesecloth, cheesemonger, cheesewood, cheesy, cheese-fly, cheese-cutter etc.., so it must be important.
10. It has a high calcium content, and so is good for your teeth, bones, skin, hair and nails.
11. Macaroni Cheese and Cauliflower Cheese would just be some pasta and a vegetable without it.
12. I used to have a boyfriend who once put a lovely piece of brie on the table and left the room to get some grapes. There were three of us dining and my boyfriend had told us remaining two not to wait for his return in order to start. I duly cut myself a modest piece of brie. On his return he took one look at the cheese, raised an eyebrow and in all seriousness said “Who cut the nose off the cheese?” and stared at me, accusingly. Clearly I had just rendered the remaining cheese beyond contempt. He had set me a test and I had failed. He seemed to think this was rather important. What offended me though was the clear insinuation that I was somehow unaware of dining etiquette - the fact of the matter was that it was a very thin piece of brie and we had just eaten Pizza in a house shared by students (of which he was one) so I didn’t really think following Debretts was that necessary! I often like to cut noses off cheeses in honour of him.

Reasons not to eat cheese:

1. It can be quite smelly.
2. It clogs your arteries and gives you heart attacks (I will admit, this is quite a big reason!)
3. It can give you nightmares...
4....and headaches.
5. It can irritate and inflame allergies.
6. If you are lactose-intolerant, you will be violently ill.
7. If you have irritable bowel syndrome, it can make it worse.
8. Lots of it will make you fat.
9. Soft cheeses can contain Listeria (because they are not pasteurised), which can give you Listeriosis, symptoms of which include fever, vomiting, headache, malaise, body aches, cough, diarrhoea, stiff neck, confusion, loss of balance and convulsions. Eeek!

On conclusion....if you eat cheese you might die!! Having said that, things like Listeriosis are very rare indeed and anyway, what’s life without risk?! Cheese....mmmm.....