Cheese please

A selection of cheeses for sale in Gijon's fortnightly weekend local crafts and produce market.

Asturias is something of a cheese lover's paradise. Its humid, temperate climate, traditional pastoralism and numerous caves amongst its limestone mountains, provide and ideal environment for its production.

Doubtless the most famous asturian cheese is 'Cabrales', a strong blue cheese from the Picos de Europa mountains in the east. When very ripe it's not for the faint of heart. There are many notable varieties of cheese from one end of Asturias to the other however. All of them perfect when washed down with a glass of local cider!

Here, Aurelio from the village of Pie de La Sierra (foot of the mountains), near the town Llanes in the east, sells his produce.

I treated myself to an assortment of his cow and goats cheese; mild, cured and blue. Very pleasant.