Japanese Sage Derby

Posted on 2006/08/29 05:04:13 (August 2006).

[Monday 28th August]
To the average (non-vegetarian) person, rennet is probably not an issue over which you'd lose any sleep. To me however, it is something of an obsession. I absolutely love cheese, but sadly this one small ingredient renders a lot of cheeses non-vegetarian. In the UK standards of labelling are superb, and it is very easy to identify cheeses which are made with non-animal rennet. In the rest of the world it seems people just don't care. Here in Japan I have never seen any labelling identifying the type of rennet used, or even mentioning it at all. So I hardly ever buy cheese here in Japan.

So I was quite pleased today to find a block of Sage Derby in a shop near where I work. Whilst obviously there was still no sign of any information on the label, it was imported from the UK, and cheese.com had it listed as vegetarian. Presumably there are several UK companies which make this cheese, and it is possible they don't all use the same type of rennet, but it did seem a fairly safe bet - vegetarian rennet is now more or less the norm for British cheeses. It was imported by Mycella and is, I believe, manufactured in the UK by Coombe Castle.

In the evening I was still in the mood for bery British food, and so made a kind of stew for dinner - not the usual red wine base, but a sauce more similar to an onion gravy. I found it quite hearty and satisfying, but I'm not really sure if it was Chie's cup of tea.

I spent some time after dinner working on my travel pages - particularly the map. I've made a first attempt at having the map work hierarchically. So rather than just bunging all the places I've been to in the world on the map all at once, they are arranged by areas. It basically works, but at present it is a bit slow and slightly rough around the edges. Oh, and it seems to cause Firefox to leak memory somewhat, which is a bit worrying.

Looking at Sage Derby pictures makes me want to eat it too!! As for the map it seems to work allright on my mother's computer, although I did not keep it open as I was worried that it might crash on me badly! :)

Posted by Lox at 2006/08/29 10:14:39.

You can make a sort of cream/curd cheese by heating up milk and squirting lemon juice in, leaving to cool and straining through muslin (or old very clean tights). The creamier the milk the better.
No good for cooking though.

Posted by Mum at 2006/08/29 17:33:00.

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