Caerphilly with leeks, mustard & ale.

“This,” Rosie Sykes explains in her Sunday Night Book, “is a sort of less cheesy, more substantial Welsh rarebit [sic]. Leeks go splendidly with most cheeses, but are a particularly good match for the more citrusy flavours of something like Caerphilly.” This also, she might have added, is ridiculous in its simplicity and congeniality after a difficult day. For each diner:

• a meticulously washed leek, trimmed and cut into ¾ inch rounds.
• 2 Tablespoons mild ale (not IPA), porter or stout
• about a Tablespoon unsalted butter
• ½ teaspoon dried thyme
• 1 Tablespoon grain mustard
• about ½ cup grated Caerphilly
• toast

1. Sweat the leek covered on medium heat with the beer, butter, thyme and seasoning until tender but not browned, usually in about 10 minutes. The liquid should be gone.

Heat the broiler (or grill to the British)

2. Stir the mustard then the cheese into the leeks and spread the leeky rabbit, as it properly is spelled, on the toast, then blast the composition until bubbly and brownish. Best eaten with the rest of the beer.

Notes:

-The Wensleydale beloved of Wallace works equally well. So does any of the hard British cheeses but the chalky ones are, as Sykes notes, best.

-Sykes’ version is teetotal. If you insist on following suit substitute water for the beer.

-If the leeks are soupy at the end of step 1, use common sense to lift the lid, raise the heat and engage in the process of reduction.

-Sykes uses a pair of fresh thyme sprigs, which is fine if less flavorful than the dried. Fish them from the leeks at the end of step 1.