A quick and easy blue cheese sauce you can rustle up in a jiffy.

Best-Selling Cheese Books

• World Cheese Book
• The Oxford Companion to Cheese
• Cheese
• Great British Cheeses
• A Year in Cheese

Years ago my father and I looked on in mild disgust how my mother indulged in blue cheese after meals. How could she eat something so wrong? Anyone with a pair of working eyeballs can see that the stuff is clearly rotten and don’t even get us started on the taste. Pah!

Twenty laters and my opinion on the matter changed ever so slightly. Okay, maybe a lot. It all started when the cooking bug hit me and I started experimenting with all kinds of exotic ingredients in the kitchen. At first I just cut out the white coloured bits from the blue cheese, carefully avoiding the bad blue bits which I’ll use in minute in sauces. The taste grew on me and years later I would happily have a slice of creamy Dolcelatte with a bit of redcurrant jelly instead of a few squares of chocolate.

Times change and so do people.

What Type of Blue Cheese?

Once you enter the world of cheese, much like wine, you’ll be swept away in the wide range of flavours and rich history this facet of the food industry has to offer. What makes blue cheese blue is a blue-green mould Penicilliom Roqueforti. The flavour of the cheese depends heavily on the animal’s diet, whether its milk has been pasteurised, the kind of starter and cultures used and the length of time and conditions under which it’s stored. Did you know that Roquefort is stored in caves and Stilton in cellars? Gorgonzola Piccante is the best option for sauces because of its perfect balance of sweetness and heat. Another great alternative is Bleu de Causses for a slightly saltier sharpness that lends itself magnificently to sauces.

Safety Note

Because of its nature it’s difficult to tell when blue cheese has gone bad. If the white parts have turned yellow and the blue parts green, has fuzzy mould on it or smells of ammonia, throw it away immediately. It might grow legs and crawl in your bed while you’re sleeping. Okay, not really.

Blue Cheese & Special Diets

Chances are that if you’re planning on enjoying some blue cheese sauce you’re not on a calorie restricted diet. You can make it slightly less calorific by using single cream or crème fraiche instead of double/heavy cream. Special diet-wise the sauce is naturally vegetarian and gluten free. Soft and mould ripened cheeses are best avoided by pregnant ladies. Psst, when my boy was 6 months old and started weaning I gave him some broccoli and stilton puree. He loved it!

Wine Pairing

When food and wine matching, we usually follow the rule of balancing and complimenting flavours and textures, however blue cheese is one of the exceptions. The classic pairing of Port and Stilton works due to the fact that we have polar opposites at play; sweet, luscious wine and salty, piquant cheese.

For this recipe Port would be too overpowering but a Cabernet Sauvignon-heavy Bordeaux wine will be perfect. Château Les Ormes Saint-Julien 2008 is a wine packed full of black fruit and spice. The tannins are grippy making it an ideal match to steak, especially when cooked medium-rare. The richness on the palate and slightly sweet black cherry, blackberry and blackcurrant fruit softens the piquancy of the cheese and everything feels smooth and creamy in the mouth.

Blue Cheese Sauce Recipe Variation

If you’d like to lend some more depth to your sauce such as a bit of alcohol, first melt a bit of butter and fry some sliced onions or finely chopped shallots until softened. Turn up the heat. Add a splash of brandy, vodka or Jack Daniels Whiskey and let it sizzle for a minute then add the cream and shortly afterwards the cream and you’re done!

What Can You Serve Blue Cheese With?

Beef

Any cut of steak, such as prime rib, fillet/tenderloin and rib-eye steak, works beautifully. Veal, hamburgers or meatballs will work great with blue cheese. There a classic dish created by the French, called Steak au Roquefort and Spain had its own version using Queso de Cabrales.

Chicken

Any cut of chicken will benefit and Buffalo Chicken Wings is an amazing option. Adding some pear to a dish will make it fun and unusual.

Pork

Pork chops or fillet/tenderloin. Don’t forget the pears!

Vegetables

Blue cheese sauce will spruce up any green vegetable that has been boiled, steamed or roasted. Broccoli, cabbage, kale and asparagus come to mind. Cauliflower is a possibility. Butternut squash and pumpkin work well with Gorgonzola too. A bowl of blue cheese sauce with potato chips/fries make an indulgent comfort food meal. Mushrooms can be added to the sauce as you’re cooking it. If you’re rolling in it, truffle and blue cheese is a match in heaven.

Pasta

Pasta mutes the flavour of blue cheese a bit and who could possibly resist that every inch of slithery pasta (pumpkin or spinach ravioli, gnocchi) is covered by this decadent sauce? Check out …..

Seafood

Because blue cheese has such a big flavour it’s better to steer clear of it when it comes to seafood but there are recipes out there that uses blue cheese sauce with tuna, escargot, mussels, salmon and halibut.

Herbs that Match with Blue Cheese

Preferably add some crushed garlic with one of the following: rosemary, thyme, oregano, sage, chives and Italian (flat-leaf) parsley. The last two herbs are best added at the end of cooking.

The reason I made this recipe so simple is because you are probably occupied with other pots and pans on cooking on the stove (think grilling steak and steaming vegetables) so this sauce literally takes only a few minutes to prepare and it’s the last and very quick step to follow before enjoying a luscious meal.

Are you ready? Because this recipe will be finished in a blink of an eye.

Heat the cream slowly in a non-stick frying pan.

When the cream starts bubbling, get the blue cheese….

…and crumble it into the cream. It’s up to you how little or much cream and cheese you use. Use more cheese if you’d like a strong flavour. Use less cream if you’d like a thicker sauce.

Stir vigorously until the sauce is perfectly smooth and serve immediately.

In this case I had it with rib-eye steak which I cooked in the sous-vide. A memorable meal!

Other Blue Cheese Recipes You Might Enjoy

• Stilton, Bacon & Potato Cakes
• Pear Pizza with Stilton & Walnuts
• Gorgonzola & Pine Nut Pasta
• Gorgonzola & Spinach Spaghetti
• Four Cheese Pizza – Quattro Formaggi

Creamy Mushroom & Sherry Sauce is another delicious sauce that can be served with steak.

1 vote

Print

Blue Cheese Sauce

Prep 1 minutes

Cook 3 minutes

Total 4 minutes

Servings 2

Author: Michelle Minnaar

A versatile sauce that can be served with chicken, beef, pork, vegetables and even pasta.

Ingredients

• 150ml (5 fl oz) double [heavy] cream
• 30g (1 oz) blue cheese

Instructions

1. Heat the cream gently in a pan.
2. Crumble the blue cheese into the cream and let it melt slowly while stirring.
3. When the sauce is smooth, serve immediately.

Recipe Notes

Serve with steak, pork, vegetables, chicken or pasta.

Courses Sauce

Cuisine French

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 70.9g

Amount Per Serving
Calories 319
% Daily Value
Total Fat 34g		52%
Total Carbohydrates 1.9g		1%
Protein 1.2g		6%

* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calorie needs.