Ok, on my trip home two days ago the airline served some "tea sanwiches" and some cheese (this was on a flight out of Heathrow).

One of the slices of cheese was of very pale color, almost white, and very dry/crumbly.
It was embedded with bits of citron or what seemed like some sort of preserved fruit and it was delicious.

i say it was "cheese" although i suppose the cheese purists will swoop in and correct me..but anyway, anyone have any ideas as to what this might be?

And yes, i apologize for not having asked the flight attendants..how very stupid of me.

I've had that in France, and you can buy it at Harris Teeter's here. Not sure where it's from or what it's called, but it's delicious!

Thanks for that tip...I'll look for it locally.

Hi Dukey,

Caerphilly, Wensleydale or Lancashire with fruit in it?

Almost certainly Wensleydale- I have trouble getting it w/o fruit in it at Whole Foods.

The stuff I had didn't have what I'd call "fruit" in it. It had what I think was candied citron.

You'll never find the answer unless you email BA.

A fair amount of "lower-quality"* Lancashire, Cheshire, Caerphilly and Wensleydale gets taken aside, mixed with some sharp fruit and gets sold in the "guilty secrets" market. Neither the major supermarkets nor cheese specialists sell much of it (it's too evocative of the messing around that used to go on with cheese before we all became foodies), but there are all sorts of brandnames - especially in the unfoody end of the market, like Harrods or the less fashionable discount grocers. A lot gets exported - because though our real cheeses have little reputation abroad, the makers are competent marketeers, and places like US branches of Whole Foods find them much more interesting than we do. So the "English" section of cheese cabinets or counters often has little more than these concoctions.

The mixtures usually have a pretty short life-span: before you've got used to the one with pickle, you'll find they're selling one with cranberries. Just sample any of the fruit/cheese mixes at any US supermarket (like WFM) that has a big cheese selection

*"lower quality" These mixes often work best with immature and/or lower fat versions of Lancashire etc, for which there's less local demand these these days, and cost less to produce. Precisely because of that, they're perfect for blending with sharp-flavoured fruit.

It'll be one of the regional cheeses Flanner mentions if it was white and crumbly, and the fruit was very probably apricots, as I've seen this added to cheese quite often.

I've heard from a cheese master (actually mistress) that they use the stuff that in the past would have been given to the pigs, and remould it.

"that in the past would have been given to the pigs"

Or more often sold in street markets or Kwiksave.

Cheese Mistress?!

Is that a proper job?

I was joking.
Cheese master is a pretty high-level qualification.
I think that a female cheese master is actually called a cheese master.

It's White Stilton with Apricot

And we have a winner....

I was thinking Stilton with apricot or Stilton with ginger.

Apricot perhaps but definitely not ginger

Waitrose sell a white Stilton with apricots, which seems a likely option.

They also do a Wensleydale with cranberries.

Kings supermarkets in the US sell a white stilton with mango and ginger that's quite tasty. I've heard, although I don't know if it's true, that Kings is owned by Marks and Spencer.