Lack of availability, frankly. I can find vegemite if I look for it, but not so Australian cheese. Send me some? 
Heh.
SDMB pedant always trumps SDMB nerd! 
Thanks all, lots of new cheeses to put on my list now.
Especially stinking bishop!
QtM - Trader Joes does some good NZ cheddar. Sharp enough to lift the roof of your mouth off. Match it up with crusty bread and a good chutney or better yet with Branston Pickle
I should point out that the best cheddar I ever had was from Vermont - Sugar Bush Farm 5-year matured. Astonishingly good.
Different kind of chutney from the Indian variety. I mean traditional English fruit chutney or Branston pickle.
Six pages of English cheeses. This is one of the best online sources for exotic cheese.
I’ve always thought that English cheeses are the best in the world. I live in Somerset, which is the home of Cheddar. There is always a large selection of local cheeses at our weekly farmers’ market.
One of my favourites at the moment is a cheddar from Cornwall which is very strong and crunchy (crunchy because it contains lactate crystals). It’s matured for two years and has a sharp, strong taste.
The range of English cheeses is huge: from cows, goats and sheep, from blue to white, from runny (Somerset brie for example) to hard. One of the joys of travelling around the country is sampling the local cheeses.
Upthread it has been mentioned that cheeses like Wensleydale and Caerphilly are bland and boring. Good ones should be delicate and subtle. Others - like the Cornish Cruncher - are ferocious with a massive taste. It’s a bit like wine: you get delicate Pinot Noirs and huge Shirazs; if they’re well made, the nuances of taste will show through in both cases.
I love the way you equate English with exotic. 
Cheeses are just all right with me,
Cheeses are just all right, Moliere!
I have a big jar of Branston pickle, it goes great with a mature cheddar (I know, boring!). I haven’t tried Pickalilly, does it go well with cheeses?
For many Americans, as I’m sure you know, the height of exotic is swiss cheese.
I’ve never understood why American cheese is so disappointing. (My daughter has just said it’s because you don’t have proper cows. 
) I’ve travelled across a lot of the US, and I’ve never thought that cheese is a major priority for Americans.
This is my new favorite:
I’ve only ever seen it once–at a new UK-based grocery store called Fresh and Easy. We just got an outlet here and they have a good selection of English and Irish cheese. I picked up the Huntsman on a whim and it was just incredible. They haven’t had any since when I’ve been there, though.
As with most parts of the world, it depends on where you shop. Grocery stores here in Canada, for instance, usually have the “generic” cheeses in the dairy section, but keep the better/more unusual cheeses in the deli section. There is an exceptional mass-market cheddar cheese here (available even in discount grocery stores) called Balderson’s, that’s better than anything I’ve found in a British supermarket*. There are truly divine cheeses made in the US, as well, especially the north/north-eastern states.
As an [ex-]Brit, it pains me to say that the UK has no monopoly on great cheese.
- Which is meant only to indicate that I’ve never had better, not that better isn’t to be found in British grocery stores!
I’ve travelled a lot and had excellent cheeses in many countries. I’ve decided that that good cheese, made properly and bought within a few miles of where it was made is a far, far superior beast to the same cheese, shipped halfway across the world. Or in some cases, even if it’s sent by road fifty miles away.
Cheese doesn’t travel.
There are small U.S. dairies that produce good cheese. The same site I linked to above lists eight pages of American cheeses. It’s just that a lot of people here have simple tastes and prefer not to be adventurous.
It’s pretty overpowering and would drown out all but the strongest cheese taste (better with ham IMO), but in Cyprus they do make really nice toasted paninis with grilled halloumi and picallili. Nom nom nom. ::drools::
Gladly if I can work out how to ship it. I notice that the results of the 2008 World Cheese Championships indicate that I may have been a little partisan. This is the largest cheese competition on earth and most winners are American or Canadian.
Cranberry chutney! I just made a batch from a Domus Cafe recipe where the chef makes the most awesome chutnies and jams.
Now I just have to get some Wensleydale to go with it…
I’m amazed at this. Either there has been a huge amount of bias, or the USA has been very remiss in spreading the word about the quality of their cheeses. I would be interested in knowing what the proportion of USA to the rest of the world’s cheeses submitted was. Or if there has been a world cheese championship held outside of Wisconsin, and what those results are.
Don’t get me wrong. American cheeses may be the greatest in the world. It’s just its reputation is more as purveyors of Monterey Jack than high quality cheeses.