Tea and Cheese - Oh my!

The cheese course seems to be the biggest trend in the culinary world. I see myself reading about it in many popular cooking magazines as of late. I myself wasn't familiar with the formal cheese course until I became a fan of the cooking reality TV show, Top Chef. All of sudden, after duck confit with roasted sunchokes, but before the lavender scented panna cotta, there appeared a plate of cheese, arranged to please the eye, with maybe a artistic dab of quince jam on the plate. The closest thing I had known to a cheese plate before hand was the heavily picked-over plastic tray of cubed Cheddar and American cheese, and if it was fancy, it had some cubed Pepper Jack as well. You would stab a cube with a tinsel-topped toothpick and place it on top of Ritz, eating it to stave off your hunger because your hosts failed to mention that there wouldn't be 'real' food at their function.

Where does tea enter the picture? Most often, we think of wine as the perfect companion to cheese; the wine and cheese party is an established theme when it comes to entertaining. I had taken an interesting workshop on tea and cheese pairing while at the World Tea Expo where this was first introduced to me. Tea, can also pair very well with cheese, as it also contains tannins. Tannins are a substance that exists in grapes and tea leaves among other things and produces that tart, astringent taste that you may experience after drinking a deep red wine or black tea. It also lends to the colour of the tea. Without tannins, both wine and tea would lack that complex taste and beautiful colour. Not all teas are tannin-rich; exceptions are White and Green teas, which contain very little tannins, while Oolongs are in the middle, and Black teas have the most. When thinking of teas to pair with your cheese plate, sticking to Black or Oolong teas are good, but including a Green tea with a grassy or vegetal note will round out your selection wonderfully.


The idea of building a cheese plate may seem intimidating, but it's a great exercise in learning about different varieties of cheeses and exposing your palate to something different. Cheese and tea have a lot in common if you think about it: both vary when it comes to the region they are grown or produced as well as yield different tastes depending on the amount of or lack of processing. There are many good guides that have come out in the last few years that can also be helpful, if you think it'll be baffling. Though there might not be a cheese shop in your town or nearby, many supermarkets are expanding their cheese sections to include a diverse selection, going beyond Cheddar and Swiss. If you are fortunate enough to have a gourmet market with an extensive department or a cheese shop nearby, your cheese monger can help you make a selection and answer your questions.


To start, you basically want to choose about 3-5 types of cheeses with different textures (hard, semi-hard, creamy, soft), milks (sheep, cow, goat), and regions (from international cheese to locally made- many possibilities here!). Have some good bread and fruits that'll complement the cheeses on hand- they can make for palate cleansers in between tasting.
For your tea, choose some flavourful teas that have distinctive notes to them. To start, try 2-3 black teas and round out with a green and an oolong; adjust to match how many cheeses you will have on hand. Some great Black teas to have as the base for your tastings: Darjeeling, Assam, Lapsang Souchong, and Yunnan; they are all full-bodied teas that can stand up to the creaminess of cheese. Prepare your tea accordingly, being sure not to over-steep. Make sure there is enough for everyone to get a good taste of, but not fill up on.
In order to create great pairings, it's important to feel and understand the relationship between the taste of the cheese and tea. Tastes can be complementary- with similar flavours or contrasting where you can taste two distinct flavours that marry well with each other. Of course, you may also come across pairings that aren't good at all. First try each tea and cheese separately to understand the flavours, and then try together to see how they meld. Experiment profusely! Remember taste is subjective; use the following pairings as guidelines.

Some favorite pairings:
• Asiago Pressata with a vegetal Green, Kukicha or Sencha (Asiago is a very mild cheese and goes well with a green tea that has a low amount of tannins).
• Irish Whiskey Cheddar with Lapsang Souchong (the smokiness of Lapsang Souchong really holds up to the bitterness of the cheese)
• Goat cheese with Assam (try with a dribble of honey on the cheese-it makes for a great flurry of flavours- the maltiness of the tea goes well with the tart of the cheese and the aftertaste of the honey).
• Brie and Darjeeling (I learned to eat the 'flurry' which is the waxy rind on the brie- it helps bring out the flavour).
• Manchego with Sencha (the tea helps mellow out the sharpness of this hard cheese)
A cheese with tea course makes a great addition for any function and the pairing will be unexpected! It's a great way to introduce unknown varieties of tea to novices. Typically the formal cheese course is served after the main course, before dessert, but can make for a great cocktail party dish. Here are more tips for a successful cheese and tea platter:
• When buying your cheeses at a specialty store or cheese shop, you can often ask to sample a piece of cheese. Take advantage of it; though you may not have tea with you, you can imagine how the cheese will taste with a smoky tasting tea, a grassy tasting tea, etc.
• Serve the cheese at room temperature, not right out of the fridge (but be sure to wrap up any leftover cheese and store it in the fridge, you don't want to leave the cheese sitting out-yuck!)
• Arrange the cheese and tea from mildest to strongest. If you were to arrange the selections above, you would start with the Asiago Pressata/Kukicha and end with the Irish Whiskey Cheddar/Lapsang Souchong pairing.
• Be creative and use fun serving pieces to display your tea and cheeses. I use thicker plastic party cups to serve my tea in so people can see the different colours of the tea's liquor. It's quite pretty.
• Cut the cheese (oooh!) from the rind to the tip (imagine a typical wedge of cheese-do not cut from the tip of the triangle for a tiny nub). Cutting this wider slice of cheese will allow you to taste the total flavour of the cheese, which can be layered.
• If you are doing a cheese and tea pairing with a group, leave out some note pads or pieces of paper so everyone can share their thoughts about each pairing. The more taste buds, the better!

Tea and cheese, anyone?
Given that China and Japan, two of the world’s three most prestigious tea-growing nations, do not have long traditions of dairy consumption in their population’s diets (although that seems to be changing as Westernization is taking hold), I set out to be deliciously subversive and pair some of the teas from those countries with cheese, leading to pleasantly surprising results. By contrast, India, the third of that tea-producing triumvirate, has a well-established tradition of using dairy products in its cuisine, marked by a generous use of clarified butter, dairy-enriched sauces dating back to the Moghul empire, delicate paneer cheese for all manner of non-vegetarian Indian specialties, milk-based desserts, and of course, in the beverage realm, the ubiquitous masala chai, which combines bold-flavoured tea with milk and spices.
Tempted by the thought that wine wasn’t the only beverage that could harmonize with cheese, I chose eight teas to pair with six cheeses: choosing five teas from mainland China (White tea, Dragonwell green, Ti Quan Yin oolong, an English Breakfast made exclusively from Keemun, and a subtly smoky Lapsang Souchong); one from Japan (Sencha); and two from India (Arya Darjeeling and Mokalbari Assam). The cheeses represented the three major categories: two based on sheep’s milk (fresh ricotta and Sardinian Pecorino), two based on cow’s milk (a Fontina called Brindisi from Oregon’s Willamette Valley Cheese Company and Fromage d’ Affinois, a 60% butterfat wonder from France), and two based on goat’s milk (one mild and soft, Pyramide from France, and the other a pungent and Spanish variety called Monte Enebro, with its flattened cylindrical shape).
I chose to taste each tea with each cheese and above and beyond the theine buzz, here are some observations from the 48 pairings:
* Drinking the white tea at 170 degrees F. provided enough heat to accentuate the sweet cream notes of the ricotta, making it yielding on the tongue and mouth filling with its fresh dairy personality.
* The floral, somewhat rose-scented warmth of the white tea, when consumed cool, harmonized beautifully with the buttery quality of the Sardinian Pecorino.
* The grapey pleasantly fermented notes in the French goat cheese played beautifully against the grassy, toasty notes of the Dragonwell green tea, imbibed at about 180 degrees F.
* Slightly cooled after brewing, the Ti Quan Yin oolong brought out the lemony notes in the Monte Enebro (Spanish goat cheese), softening some of the cheese’s aggressive barnyard aroma.
* With its sweet orchidy essence, this same tea was a fitting partner to the decadently rich Fromage d’Affinois, with its creamy mellow melting quality.
* The Assam’s malty character was a nice foil for the Brindisi Fontina, which softened the tannins in the tea, setting up the palate for just one more bite of room-temperature Pyramide.
* With its almost caramel-like sweetness, the Fontina also stood up nicely to the smokiness in the Lapsang Souchong, leaving me wishing to explore whether smoked cheeses and smoked tea would prove to be too much of a good thing.
* Proving to be unflattering to any of the cheeses, the Japanese Sencha, born from a formerly non-dairy-consuming country, did not betray its heritage and would be best consumed with noodle dishes, seafood, and sushi, if sake were off-limits.
Hardly the last word on pairings of the brewed leaf and milk’s leap into immortality, this tasting poses as many questions as it answers about how tea and cheeses can enhance each other when tasted in tandem; I hope you’re inspired to dig in and explore.

The Pairings
Here are sources’ guidelines for pairings, with examples:
• Pair opposing flavours – the salty, fruity flavour of Taleggio with the peppery, chocolaty notes of Risheehat First Flush Darjeeling (Barenholtz), or sweet Lychee Black or Pouchong and with salty Gorgonzola or Shropshire Blue (Gold).
• Play on similarities – the grassy-sweetness of Nevat with grassy-sweet Japanese greens, or the herbaceous Vento d’Estate with the honey-hay notes of Golden Needle Yunnan (Barenholtz).
• Consider texture – the fat of a rich Brie with a brisk, palette-cleansing Darjeeling First Flush (Gold).
• Bring out sub-tones and sub-textures – well-aged Comte emphasizes the cleanliness and chestnut tones of Dragonwell (Gold).
• Follow the seasons – seasonally available Irish whiskey cheddar with cold-weather teas like Lapsang Souchong (Enck).

Tea and Cheese Pairing
We are used to pairing food and wine, wine and cheese, wine and chocolate... but like with wines, tea and cheese both come in a myriad of textures, flavours and strengths and they can be matched together.
I love a good cup of tea- there is something so refreshing and healing about it that wine just can't match, but I also love a creamy, opulent cheese, so I was happy to read that the two can go together.
Here are some suggested teas to be paired with your different cheeses:
* Asiago (a very mild cheese): Goes well with a green tea that has a low amount of tannins. Try Keemun, Pai Mu Dan
* Brie: Darjeeling, Tung Ting Oolong
* Camembert: Dragonwell, Chun Mee, Gunpowder, Ha Giang, First-Flush Darjeeling, Sikkim
* Cheddar: Tung Ting Oolong, Darjeeling
* Blue tea potCream Cheese: Ceylon, Darjeeling, Cameroon
* Edam: Ceylon, Autumnal Darjeeling, Buddha’s Finger Oolong
* Gorgonzola: Chun Mee, Ha Giang, Ceylon, Pouchong
* Muenster: Tung Ting Oolong, Pouchong
* Provolone: Ceylon, Nilgiri
I would suggest using good quality cheeses and teas, as the range in quality of both cheese and tea is significant.