Anyone who knows me will tell you that I am completely addicted to cheese – anything smelly, gooey and running off a plate.

My real favorites have always been alpine cheeses like Vacherin Mont d’or, Raclette, Abondance, Reblechon or any cheese with a really strong flavour like a Munster, Epoisses or more recently an English Vintage Cheddar or Stinking Bishop.  

This weekend however, I stayed in the Cotswolds in a beautiful village called Oddington. I have always had masses of respect for british cheese making, but didn’t really think there was much competition to the French farms. Well, how wrong was I?  And how ignorant do I feel, seeing as I always thought I knew a fair amount about cheese…

So this weekend, I was introduced to some cheese from a farm in nearby Kingham, which interestingly belongs to Blur’s Alex James. That in itself warrants a taste!  I have to say I was gobsmacked and completely blown away by his cheese, especially his Stow Soft, which looks like a large goats cheese with its classic white rind exterior.  

Before eating the cheese, I  was instructed to slice the top off and then take a spoon and dig into the cheese…oh wow!  As I dragged the spoon out of the cheese, it dripped over the cheese board and I slurped it onto the side of my plate. Forget the biscuit, this was a time for indulgence so I dipped my finger into the cheese, which was walking itself off my plate, wrapped as much as I could around my finger and in it went – Such a complex and intense flavour, and just so gooey, that’s it, I have found my new favourite.  It may be the morning, but I am salivating just thinking about it – God I love cheese!  Then if that wasn’t good enough, I tried the Kingham Green, also from the same farm…where can I get some more of this?!

Forget French cheeses for the moment, I am on a mission to taste more of these British cheeses, and how happy am I to find that I can buy Alex’s Kingham cheese in London – and strangely enough I passed the very shop on Friday walking through Pimlico and thought I should get around to writing something about it.  Daylesford Organic http://www.daylesfordorganic.com/icat/cheese.  As well as Pimlico, there is also a store on Westbourne Grove.

If you are a fan of good organic food, this is the shop for you.  It just smells fantastic, you walk into the open-plan black and white crisp hall, and the food is just calling out for you to try some and take it home..okay so you need a new mortgage once you come out – but its soooo worth it!