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Photographing this cheese was a battle of wills between me and the cheese. I think the cheese won! It must be the stickiest cheese I've ever come across. And it has a quite astonishing smell!
So, you're getting the idea: this is not run-of-the-mill. And neither is its maker, Charles Martell. His enthusiasm for perry pears (i.e pears used to make perry, the pear juice equivalent to cider) led to his tracking down numerous old varieties and the creation of the first national collection. Later he started making cheese and he now produces produces fine Double and Single Gloucester. His best-known cheese, Stinking Bishop, brings these two interests together, since it's curds are washed in perry.
There's no doubt that Martell has created a cheese of great distinction, smelly for sure, think Pont L'Eveque or Epoisses, but with a delightful taste – sweetish and, despite what the smell might suggest, actually not overwhelmingly strong.
I warmed to Martell when he was interviewed on Radio 4's Today Programme about the likely impact of Stinking Bishop cropping up in the last Wallace and Gromit film. He said he didn't really want to sell more or he'd have to employ more people and that would mean building a bigger car park!
Stinking Bishop is available only as whole cheeses in two sizes - 500g and 2kg. We don't think it's a good idea to offer this cheese cut: it's just too soft and would probably suffer in transit.
Like the sound of this? If so, you might also want to look at Alderwood or Keltic Gold.
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