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Chocolate And Cheese Are The Unexpected Pairing You Need To Try

Okay, so maybe it's a bit of a stretch to call chocolate and cheese an unexpected pairing (cheese and ice cream, on the other hand ... now that's an unexpected pairing). The salty, high-fat dairy product has long been paired with sweet and decadent chocolate on charcuterie boards, at girls' nights, and on Valentine's Day dates for years and years. But you might not be thinking outside the box enough when it comes to your pairings. That's why Matthew Rose, partner of Fairfield and Greenwich Cheese Company, exclusively offered Chowhound some fresh ideas for under-the-radar cheeses that might just take your late-night snacking to the next level.

Finding the perfect pairing for cheese and chocolate is a little like finding the perfect pairing of people — you're looking for combos that naturally play off of each other. "Sweet and savory work together so well because they each bring an element to the table that the other lacks," Rose explains.

The true key to creative combos, though? Not being afraid to experiment. Sure, cheddar cheese and Hershey's taste nice together, but there's a whole other world of wonderful duo bites out there just waiting to be found. "Cheeses by nature are salty and tangy, and when paired with almost anything on the sweet side, they will work to some degree," Rose says. "But to find those truly amazing combinations you need to be conscious of what each accompaniment brings to the table and you need to not be afraid to experiment and see what is most appealing to you when you start laying flavors for yourself."

White chocolate and Manchego

Matthew Rose's first suggestion is already removing us from the realm of cliché, taking the least popular kind of chocolate — in fact, until 2002, the FDA didn't even consider white chocolate to be "real" chocolate — and highlighting its strengths. Without the intense and slightly bitter flavor of darker chocolates, what factors make good white chocolate stand out?

"White chocolate has a rich fattiness to it and a subtle acidity that can really shine when tasted with a cheese that has a nice clean nuttiness," Rose says. He suggests Emmentaler from Switzerland, which you may have heard referred to simply as Swiss cheese; Ossau-Iraty from France, a nutty sheep's milk cheese; or Manchego, Spain's most famous cheese. Each is a fairly hard cheese with a nutty flavor that pairs with creamy white chocolate much as a creamy soup is best topped with salty, toasted nuts. Who knows? Maybe it's time for all of us to give white chocolate another chance.

Milk chocolate and washed rind cheeses

Next up is the chocolate that likely most reminds you of your middle school days. Hershey's kisses and milk chocolate advent calendars may make the mild, sweet chocolate out to be a little juvenile, but the cheeses that Matthew Rose recommends pairing with it are anything but. "Milk chocolate tends to go best with washed rind cheeses that have a bready, toasty, savory quality," he says.

Washed rind cheeses cover a wide variety of flavors, but it essentially means that briny water was added to the outside of cheese at various points during aging, encouraging (non-harmful) bacteria to grow. Weird, right? But it works — these bacteria break down the cheese, making it creamy, gooey, and, yes, a little bit stinky. Other than their smell, you can recognize these cheeses by the reddish color of their rind. Rose's specific suggestions are some of the hallmarks of this cheese type: fudgy Grayson from Virginia or the mild Italian Taleggio, often compared to brie. With these elegant pairings, no one will dare call your choice of milk chocolate immature again.

Dark chocolate and blue cheese

Ah, dark chocolate. The cream of the crop. If you're a dark chocolate lover, you're probably thinking something along the lines of, "What cheese wouldn't go well with a good piece of 72% dark Ghirardelli?" If not, well, buckle up, because Matthew Rose's suggestion for this one pairs controversial with controversial by recommending a bit of blue cheese to go with your bitter chocolate. "The milkiness present in blue cheeses will interact with the more intense notes of the dark chocolate, and will soften and highlight the interesting flavor notes that can hide underneath the surface," Rose says.

His specific suggestions include the deeply flavorful Bayley Hazen Blue from Vermont or the well-known English Stilton. The latter is known for having a more mild flavor, making it more approachable for those who might be intimidated by the famously sharp and pungent taste of blue cheese. As blue cheese enthusiasts often put it: "There's a blue for you."

Raspberry chocolate and Gruyère

We're really getting our creative juices flowing now — moving into filled chocolates, Matthew Rose begins with a recommendation for raspberry-filled chocolate. These fruity, often tart chocolates offer an all-new flavor palate to put your cheese creativity to the test, and Matthew Rose likens all his recommended pairings to a classic dessert. "Cheeses [that] have roasted, savory, nutty flavors and work well with berry fruits and preserves [...] leave me feeling like I have just eaten a delicious pastry or pie," he says.

His first recommendation is a classic: Switzerland's creamy, nutty Gruyère, a hard cow's milk cheese that's often used in baking. His other suggestion comes from Wisconsin, the U.S. state that produces the most cheese. There, the Pleasant Ridge Reserve provides a stateside alternative to Gruyère that also happens to be the most-awarded cheese in American history.

Caramel chocolate and goat's milk cheeses

Some days, it almost feels like caramel was invented solely to be paired with chocolate. The decadent, rich, buttery flavor of slowly heated sugar is truly a miracle of food science, and there's no better feeling than biting into a mystery chocolate from a box of truffles and discovering that you landed the caramel-filled one. It's hard to think there's any way to improve on perfection, but Matthew Rose has a pairing that might just elevate the combo to a new level: goat's milk cheese. "The tangy and citrusy flavors in a good goat's milk cheese will bring lots of levity to a nice caramel and the sweetness will really play off the acidity of a fresh cheese," Rose says.

Looking for specifics? Rose suggests selecting something really bright, such as a traditional Chabichou, a zesty, summery soft cheese from France, or the lesser-known, but still wonderfully gooey and light Wisconsin-made Shabby Shoe cheese from Blakesville Creamery.

Peanut butter chocolate and brie

Bringing it in for the grand finale, Matthew Rose has a pairing to share that's perfect for late-night snacking, post-Halloween use of uneaten candy bars, and generally increasing your level of joy. Unless you're allergic to nuts — in that case, please skip this suggestion. The creamy, salty duo perfect to wrap up this list? Peanut butter filled chocolate and triple crème brie. "[It] would be like the most delicious fluffernutter sandwich," Rose says. "It's nutty and roasty and milky and salty!" As compared to regular brie cheese, triple crème brie has even more cream added during production, resulting in a high butterfat content that (you guessed it) makes the cheese even softer and creamier, perfect to spread on your chocolate or dip it in.

Putting Rose's experimentation advice to good use, we have our own idea. Could this pairing be translated to brie and Trader Joe's dark chocolate peanut butter cups, perhaps? Seems there's only one way to find out...

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