When I look back at what I was like when young, I find myself drawing parallels between myself and a certain young character from the television show Modern Family. No, sadly it wasn’t smart Alex, hot Hayley or adorable Luke, it’s actually Manny. Yep Manny who dresses like an adult and quotes lines from books. I wasn’t as learned as he but I think he and I would have been friends.
When my friends were reading Dolly magazine, I was reading Cleo and instead of going to nightclubs or pubs, I went to hotel bars to drink cocktails. I’ve always had older friends and when my parents went away for a short trip and left my in the house aged 17, instead of having a rip roaring drunken party, I threw a dinner party and invited 10 friends over.
It’s a meal that Miss America still remembers to this day as he loved the blue cheese salad that I made. I remember it for a few other reasons. It was my first dinner party ever and I was stressed as I could be. I was mostly in the kitchen stressing over the dishes while everyone enjoyed themselves in the dining room. I was also heavy handed with the blue cheese in the salad and when I finally got to sit down and eat the salad I almost gagged. Completely unused to how strong the blue cheese that I bought was, I had generously apportioned it and it was strong stuff. My older friends were much more familiar with it and loved it but I gently pushed it away quietly. I learned a few things that day: don’t serve a dish without first trying it and don’t choose dishes that will have you stuck in the kitchen the entire time.
I’ve since come to love blue cheese and so does Mr NQN so it’s often found in our fridge. I had somewhat of a lovely bounty sent to me recently where I received three large blocks of 2013 award winning Grand Champion Australian cheeses awarded by Dairy Australia. There was a Champion Hard Cheese – Mil Lel Superior Parmesan by Lion Dairy & Drinks, the Champion Blue Cheese – Old Telegraph Road Heritage Blue by Jindi Cheese and the Champion Cheddar-Style Cheese – Pyengana Cheddar by Pyengana Dairy.
Now the first instinct would have been to eat these straight or with some home made lavosh. But as these were such generous portions I really wanted to make batches of cheese biscuits to give to friends for Christmas. My friend P Bella gave me a recipe for cheddar cheese biscuits (cookies for American readers) which were beautifully crumbly and cheesy and I used this to base a blue cheese, cranberry and pistachio biscuit.
There was much testing and tasting (no hardship really except as far as putting on weight was concerned) until I was finally happy with the results. And I bring these to you in case you want to put out some cheese biscuits for Christmas or box these up for friends. I also tell people that these are really good if you pop them in a warm oven for 5 minutes or so just to crisp them up before serving them. Or you can freeze them, thaw them out and bake them fresh. As for me, I’m off to do some exercise now but not until after I sneak in a couple of these biscuits!
So tell me Dear Reader, what television character do you relate to most? And which cheeses are your favourite? If you could judge any sort of food, which one would you want to judge?
Cheddar Cheese Biscuits
- 125g/4 ozs cheddar cheese
- 2 tablespoons parmesan cheese
- 125g/4ozs butter, cold and cut into cubes
- 2/3 cup plain all purpose flour
- 1/3 cup cornstarch or cornflour
- 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1.5-2 tablespoons lemon juice
1. In a food processor, chop the cheese and parmesan into small crumbs (or you can grate it but this is easier). Add the butter, flour, cornstarch or cornflour, baking powder and cayenne pepper and process until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Then add the lemon juice and pulse until it just comes together.
2. Line a clean surface with parchment and empty the mix onto the parchment and shape it until it becomes like a sausage. Place in freezer for 30 minutes or so or in a fridge for a few hours. You can also freeze these and thaw when needed.
3. Preheat oven to 180C/350F. Line two trays with parchment and slice into half inch wide discs. Place these an inch apart as shown as they will spread. Bake for 10-12 minutes and then allow to cool completely before removing from the tray as they will be quite delicate.
Blue Cheese, Cranberry & Pistachio Biscuits
An Original Recipe by Not Quite Nigella
- 125g/4 ozs blue cheese
- 1/2 cup dried cranberries
- 125g/4ozs butter, cold and cut into cubes
- 1 cup plain all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup cornstarch or cornflour
- 1/4 cup white superfine or caster sugar
- 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 cup pistachios, finely chopped
2. Line a clean surface with parchment and empty half of the mix onto the parchment and shape it until it becomes like a sausage. Roll in the pistachio crumbs until the sides are completely coated in them. Repeat with the other half of the biscuit mixture. Place in freezer for 30 minutes or so or in a fridge for a few hours. You can also freeze these and thaw when needed.
3. Preheat oven to 180C/350F. Line two trays with parchment and slice into half inch wide discs. Place these an inch apart as shown as they will spread. Bake for 10-12 minutes and then allow to cool completely before removing from the tray as they will be quite delicate. Store in an airtight container.
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62 Comments | Add your own
Oh I love both variations! A perfect holiday gift or appetizer!
Wonderful gifts! Those biscuits must taste so good. Gorgeous flavors.
Cheers,
Rosa
Delicious! Perfect for this time of year too – great to keep a couple of logs in the fridge for quick gifts!
That cheese looks so awesome and so do these really original cookies. When you described what you did when younger I thought you were writing about, same thing.
I think you and I would have been friends too. In grade 11, I took an art class and several of the students were known ‘druggies’ in the school. I got on with them quite well, even though I wasn’t one of their group. We joked and kidded one another without prejudice. One day, it dawned on me that they never once offered me any of their products, so I asked why! Apparently they figured I wouldn’t be interested, and we left it at that!
One of my early dinner parties for JT’s birthday took me 14 hours to prepare. I was exhausted and couldn’t even enjoy the dinner. That was a lesson that I never again repeated!
Cheese biscuits are one of our favourites, but I haven’t found a recipe for blue cheese, so I’m putting this on ‘the list’. You’re killing me Lorraine, stop making these tantalizing posts that make me want to make them.
Oh my gosh, I just ate an entire wedge of blue cheese straight over the course of two days with a spoon. The stronger the better! I would’ve loved your salad
i like those savoury cheese biscuits!
-i wish i could judge different types of tea, that would give me the excuse to drink more tea than i do already
These biscuits sound lovely – we had to make cheddar cheese biscuits for FFWD this week. I am most like Liz Lemon – but I cook.
Cannot wait to try these Lorraine – they look delicious. I loved “The Patty Duke” show and often wished I were both characters Patty and Cathy (the ying and yang) – that would be fun! Have a great day, and thank you for all your wonderful, inventive recipes this past year!! Merry Christmas.
I preferred wine bars and cocktails too. I also used to throw dinner parties – any chance I got. And yes, there were the inevitable disasters that went with being super confident (and not much of a taster either!). I LOVE blue cheese biscuits. I first had them in Scotland in a gorgeous little oat number with sweet wine and grapes after dinner. It was truly a toe curling experience. As for my fave cheese, any blue cheese and I also recently rediscovered goats cheese in Adelaide. I had it with dried pears and peaches and it was amazing. Oh and camembert, not to mention a lovely smokey cheddar and I find it hard to go passed a peppery pecorino or parmesan. I’m a cheese lover…..
Thanks for another delicious idea & inspiration! Where oh where did you buy the packaging?
Yum! I am always happy to make a biscuit that can go in the freezer for later. These are a great idea for this time of year when having a ready to make snack in the freezer can be very handy
Ha, you sounded like a delightful odd bod when you were a young(er) NQN. I wish I liked blue cheese because they look so fabulous rolled in the pistachios. How do you think swapping with parmesan or a bitey cheddar would go?
I make a cheddar cracker but your blue cheese one is calling my name loudly. I can’t wait to try them.
What a lovely recipe. Thank you. Coincidence as well that the first opportunity for the house to myself as a teenager I also had a dinner party. I just tried to mimic my mother however – 70′s Apricot Chicken!
Favorite cheese – Roquefort
TV character – ooh, don’t really watch TV
Judge – Chocolate, chocolate!!
Do you remember or had opportunity to watch Little House on the Prairie? Well, when I was young, everybody told me I looked like Laura Ingalls, including my family. And honestly, I looked like her…ja,ja,ja..
I love Modern Family! I hosted my first dinner party at 18 when my parents were away and I invited 10 guests and I cooked way too much food. I had no idea what I was doing and I think the friends I invited weren’t at the ‘dinner party’ stage of their lives yet and just wanted to ‘party’. I’ve had better nights! xx
LOVE these – they look so tasty. Mmmm, cheese…
Modern Family is hilarious, I think I was part of all those kids, but at 18 found myself working and living with 24 year olds and grew up pretty fast. I’m only just coming to love blue cheese but absolutely love the idea of these biscuits! What a lovely gift!
These look fantastic… I wonder if there will be any left for gifts
Favourite cheese? It’s a bit like your children, you have to love them all but sometimes you might feel like spending more time with one than another!
Lorraine these look divine and I love blue cheese too – our whole family does – on it’s own as part of a antipasto platter or in risotto, with pasta or gnocchi; absolutely delicious. Now I will have to find time to make these before Christmas, I am certain they will be a hit with everyone.
Wahhh I’ve never thought of putting blue cheese and cranberry and pistachio together hehe I thought they were two different type of cookies at first but wow
Very festive flavours and I love all types of cheese! Parmesan, Cheddar, Blue Cheese Gruyere love it all! 
Ohhh Modern Family hehe I think I relate to Manny too!!! My sisters are all so much older than me 14 years older ~ so i have always gotten along better with friends that are older too ~ Someone else that I relate to is Gloria hahaha dont’ know why she’s so funny!
Perfect for gifting! I was looking for a decent savoury biscuit, everyone does sweet! thanks
What delightful cookies, TRUE!
LOVE the idea re blue cheese too!
You and I would have been friends as I was LIGHT YEARS away from people the same age…used to think it was me,
NOW I know and embrace my uniqueness and KNOW each experience led me to my destiny!
I became fascinated with all the serious rules and regulations re CWA when on Masterchef, TRUE! I am not a baker, but would love to learn to judge all baking things create too!
If not a baking judge, than would like to judge dishes created by Marco Pierre White,
Think the judging experience would EXCITE and DELIGHT, let alone fright lol
I just want those big blocks of cheese now… :/
A wise person once told me never to serve guests a meal you have never made before. I choose to ignore that advice otherwise I would simply never have time to try new recipes! Instead, I make sure I taste it before serving, and am sure to have a Plan B up my sleeve if it all goes horribly wrong.
This is going to sound quite strange but I think I’d like to judge fresh produce. My usual favourites – cakes, chocolate etc – would become too sweet too quickly which I feel would ruin the experience for me. Cheese would come a close second though!
[Smiling] If I did eat cookies, these would appeal greatly and your story was even better
! Love the blue cheeses but am enamoured in a good runny camembert or brie even more! And if I could have my druthers and they would not be against my thinking patterns, would love to judge pates and terrines 
! I don’t have time to watch any TV serials, but would love to have the intellectualism of Jennie Brockie [Insight] and the charm of Maeve O’Meara ! {Oz politics/sociology and cooking].
I can never quite get used to the taste of blue cheese! Maybe I will like it when I grow older and more mature
But I do have to say those biscuits look very appetising!
I want cheese biscuits!
Beautiful Lorraine – thanks for the recipes.
OK, Lorraine, you cracked me up with the opening line: “When I look back at what I was like when young…”
Sorry, I couldn’t help my giggles… You are young, and wonderful, remember that! 
I love your biscuits! I love all things cheese!
Hey Lorraine would u mind sharing where you got the plastic cylinder cases? Many thanks in advance.
Hmmm, I don’t know, but I wish I looked like Manny’s mother in the show! I like her accent too!
So fabulous, what a wonderful mix of flavours!
I think I might be a bit like Leonard in Big Bang. Hopefully a bit of a loveable nerd, a bit quirky, and surrounded by odd characters that I love but can drive me up the wall sometimes! (And we’re both lactose intolerant too!)
Savoury biscuits! I love them! I think I would have a hard time trying to stop myself from eating those cheddar biscuits. And I really like how those pistachio ones look.
I love modern family and I like Manny’s character a lot!It’s fun reading about your story about the dinner party you threw!
Ooh I love the biscuit tubes where did you get them? I’m probably a bit like Claire and not only because we save the share the same name.
Anything with blue cheese is a winner in my mind. How delicious
This is so wonderful – love every bite and texture of this biscuits.
Love the look (and combo!) of the pistachio crusted biscuts – very festive. I do adore cheese…
Such a cute idea!
Roseanne.
And you can send me mine in the new year. That way I don’t have to share
Liz Lemon from 30 Rock and I love triple cream brie – cheese I can eat with a spoon
Ai-Ling
Crikey those look fantastic, I can almost taste them! You are genius!
Isn’t it funny your story about your dinner party. My older son was and is the same – each time husband and I went away and left the house to Clem, he had a dinner party ha ha ha. We thought he was weird but we were really happy! And we LOVE blue cheese (and cheddar for that matter) and your biscuits are great! I must make these!
Beautifully packaged and fantastic dishes, but o coarse the Pyengana is worth its weight in gold ( and one of my favourite cheeses and the Telegraph heritage is a lovely blue, like all of their gorgeous cheeses. …Oh takes me back to working with cheese. At 18 I was an apprentice Chef and none of my friends were into food at all, so I didnt bother cooking for them….I just took a job in Thredbo for the winter and practised on some real people. I was always on staff meal and out to impress my workmates.!.
Just gorgeous, dear! And what a lovely bounty of cheeses indeed, you lucky thing! 1) I can’t go past camembert 2) Somehow can relate to Alice Springs Horton from the Vicar of Dibley though I’m not blonde (but definitely a bit dippy, lol) and 3) chocolate ice cream!
great gift idea, lorraine…if i could bear to part with them.
Meredith Grey from Grey’s Anatomy.
My favorite is cheddar cheese (and I loved this recipe since I love savory cookies)
I wouldn’t want to judge any food. Terrible cook here so I tend to appreciate everyone who can put something warm on the table.
Lorraine, I knew we had a lot in common… I was just like you when I was young… including the youthful never too much of a good thing mentality. Looks like we conquered our early mistakes.
Your biscuits are perfect for the holidays… have a great one, I’ve missed my visits.
The biscuits look delicious! Happy Christmas to you both
Ditto Sally, would love to know where to get those cylinders for the packaging! What gorgeous looking things they are, says my alter ego, Liz Lemon.
Such gorgeous biscuits Lorraine!
These sound delicious Lorraine and I love the way you have packaged them! Merry Xmas to you and Mr NQN (almost typed his real name then!)
YUM! These look amazing. Happy Christmas Lorraine!
I would also love to know where you found that gorgeous packaging 
those blue cheese biscuits look great for gifts – must bookmark them when I have a little more energy and then when I have even more energy I will bake them – must bake them!
would have loved to be at your first dinner party – my friends were not necessarily older than me but I was quite excited to finally be in my own (share) house and hold a dinner party at about 19 years old! I remember making baileys cheesecake
I love the addition of cranberries. Nice. Happy Christmas, Lorraine.
Wow, these are gorgeous! MUST MAKE.
Back in the late 80′s when I got married – I spent 3 days on dinner parties, and took time off work to do them. Day one was out in the markets and supermarkets buying everything I needed (obviously evenings prior had been spent in careful selection of recipes). If there was time that evening work would begin. Day two was all peparation. Day three, buying up ingredients that needed to be fresh that day, and final preparation. What I didn’t realise until I divorced, was that I never really enjoyed any of the dinner parties – albeit that I loved the preparation! I simply didn’t spend much time with our guests. Since then I’ve made sure my kitchen and dining areas are together wherever I live, so that I can still enjoy the company of friends and enjoy food preparation at the same time. I must say too that I have not indulged in the classcal french cookery that I was trained in,I now tend towards fresh food cooked quickly so that I can cook on a whim – no long preparation required!
My favorite cheese – just to eat – is kafalograviera -but I haven’t seen it since the 90′s,and as I now live in the country, the odds of me finding it again are a bit remote. My memory of it though is exquisite! My needs are simple!
Love your blogs and thanks so much for what you do!
Thank you for these recipes. I made the cheddar cheese biscuits today, and they are amazing! I can’t wait to make the blue cheese & cranberry now. Cheese biscuits have always been rather ordinary, but these are gorgeous.
Hi Josie! YAY! I’m so glad that you liked them and I’m with you, there are some so so biscuits but these ones are a bit different! Thanks for letting us know!
LOVE your recipes – they work! I loved these biscuits though they came out HUGE because I didn’t realise they’d spread in the oven. The upside was that I got to eat bigger biscuits.. Mine also needed more cooking time to get brown. Soooo delicious. Thank you!
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