Are Red Rose folk turning their backs on Lancashire cheese this Christmas?

Lancastrians are turning their backs on one of the Red Rose county's mast famous foods this Christmas.
Lancashire cheese is losing out to Cheddar as the Red Rose county's favourite at ChristmasLancashire cheese is losing out to Cheddar as the Red Rose county's favourite at Christmas
Lancashire cheese is losing out to Cheddar as the Red Rose county's favourite at Christmas

A new study has looked at Lancashire's favourite cheeses to have over the festive season, and incredibly, Cheddar has come out on top.

The county's famous cheese comes a lowly third on the list, behind Red Leicester.

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With Christmas fast approaching, research reveals Lancashire’s 2018 yuletide cheeseboard will be almost entirely made up of British cheeses, with Cheddar coming out on top.

The findings from Arla, the UK’s largest cheese producer, show just how proud we are of our UK-made fare, with 68 per cent of us saying that British cheese producers are better than our French neighbours. The dairy co-operative, which includes 2,400 British dairy farmers amongst its owners, estimates it will sell over 7,000 tonnes of cheddar through UK retailers this December.

The survey of 2,000 consumers also found that we spend an average of £38.50 on our cheesy festive fare, and eight out of ten cheeses on the all-important cheeseboard will be British this year. Lancashire’s ultimate 2018 Christmas cheeseboard would be made up of the following ten cheeses: Cheddar, Red Leicester, Cheshire,Lancashire, Double Gloucester, Stilton, Wensleydale, Wensleydale and cranberries, Parmesan and Camembert.

Ben Hartley, is a farmer with 350 dairy cows in Clitheroe. He said: “Christmas Day is like any other day for dairy farmers. The cows still need milking, feeding and the farm looking after so we can make sure we’re meeting the demand there is all year round.

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"it’s a great feeling to know we’ve played a part in the milk and cheese products that make Christmas dinners taste amazin”

We’re fast becoming a foodie nation that is obsessed with cheese, with 90 per cent of the 2,000 respondents saying they know more about cheese than they did 10 years ago.

The research also shows that we like to eat cheese with some pickle (39 per cent) or a blob of chutney (34 per cent) but around one in ten of us are a bit more adventurous and pair it with chocolate (8 per cent) or Marmite (9 per cent).

Cheese-eating differs by region with one in five people in Yorkshire eating Wensleydale with a slice of Christmas cake. One in ten of us love a bit of deep fried Brie with cranberry sauce and four percent will fry some Stilton with leftover Christmas pudding.

Lancashire’s top 10 favourite cheeses:

1 Cheddar (58 per cent)

2 Red Leicester (45 per cent)

3 Lancashire (45 per cent)

4 Wensleydale (30 per cent)

5 Cheshire (25 per cent)

6 Parmesan (23 per cent)

7 Double Gloucester (23 per cent)

8 Brie (21 per cent)

9 Wensleydale and cranberries (21 per cent)

10 Stilton (20 per cent)