Wallace & Gromit cheese helps fight recession
Wensleydale, the crumbly British cheese that fuelled the capers of animated characters Wallace and Gromit, has been singled out as the star performer of the country’s food and drink exports, defying the recession to bring home bumper profits.
The Wensleydale dairy, in the North Yorkshire town of Hawes, now sends nearly £2 million worth of its produce overseas — mostly to the U.S. and Canada — a two-year increase of 23 percent, according to the Daily Telegraph.
The paper said a weak pound had helped make UK food and drink exports more attractive to the tune of £209 million, with cheese at the forefront.
It is even being exported to France, from where monks brought their cheese-making skills to Wensleydale 850 years ago, according to the Telegraph.
Wensleydale’s latest figures, released by government body UK Trade & Industry, highlight almost two decades of successful growth for the dairy since its sweetly acidic product was first consumed in Wallace and Gromit’s first claymation outing.
Since then, the animated inventor and his dog have been used to market the cheese, and help promote its application for Protected Designation of Origin status — European regulation that would ban cheeses from other areas claiming the name Wensleydale.
It’s a shame that Wensleydale is leading the British cheese invasion of the US as I’ve always found it rather mild for my tastes - a bit like what the Dave Clark Five were to the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. I suppose, to continue the analogy, the Beatles would be a mature cheddar while Jagger et al. would be something to suit a richer pallette - a Shropshire Blue perhaps or even a Huntsman. The Who would be something exotic and flashy like a Somerset Brie or a Stinking Bishop. Of course, the Americans never really took to the great British bands of the era such as the Kinks and the Small Faces. I’ve always thought of Ray Davies as an aquired taste, like a good Lincolnshire Poacher.
Have any other fans of dairy produce ever imagined their favourite cheeses as popular music combos?