Feta is undoubtedly the best known and most widely eaten Greek cheese in the UK, if not internationally. It’s a salty, crumbly cheese made with sheep’s and goat’s milk and bears the EU’s protected denomination of origin – PDO – status, which means authentic feta can only come from Greece itself. As well as tasting delicious with its unmistakable tang, feta is an incredibly useful cheese to have in the fridge as it keeps for a long time, often over six months from purchase.
The food writer Georgina Hayden grew up in north London with her Greek Cypriot family and shares this heritage in her recipes and writing, from Taverna, Nistisima and Greekish to the brand new MEDesque: Everyday recipes with Mediterranean Roots (Bloomsbury, £26).
Can we buy good feta in British supermarkets? “You really can now,” she says. “In terms of brands, I highly rate everything Odysea makes and imports. The producers they work with are incredible and their feta is top notch. Also, look for feta that comes in a tub and is stored in brine for some of the best quality. Epiros is another I really like.”
Some cheaper blocks that aren’t feta are now labelled “Greek cheese” – should we bother with these? “That’s a tough one,” Hayden says. “It’s a bit like asking would you buy cheddar if it wasn’t from the UK? While I am sure you can still get a decent feta-style cheese outside of Greece, my honest opinion is we should protect these labels and buy from the source.”
Most of us probably first met feta in a Greek salad, typically made with peppers, tomatoes, olives, red onion and oregano. I regularly eat it as an “instant” dinner, covering a block in a tin of tomatoes, maybe with chickpeas and oregano or some fresh tomatoes and chilli, and bake for half an hour or so at 180°C then eat with good bread. It’s also becoming more popular as a picnic or BBQ dip, with Waitrose reporting that searches for whipped feta are up 45 per cent week-on-week as our sunny summer dining season kicks off.
Hayden recommends a dish called from her new book MEDesque that she calls seadas saganaki. “Feta is mixed with mozzarella and pecorino, stuffed into filo parcels and pan fried with honey, chilli and thyme,” she explains. “From Greekish, I love it in the baklava cheesecake – the salty creamy sweet filling is heaven.”
I’ve made the baklava cheesecake several times. It’s a genius fusion dessert that transforms the cheesecake base by fashioning it out of sheets of filo pastry layered with toasted nuts and syrup and mixing feta with cream cheese, double cream and white chocolate for the filling. Another that I love from Greekish is the roasted lemon, oregano and feta potatoes. In other words, feta can take you much further than a salad! Here’s my review of 13 high-street feta cheeses.
Tesco Finest Barrel Aged Feta
£4.40/250g (£17.60/kg)
The flavour of this one grows on me, starting off with the rounded notes of a good sheep’s cheese and developing into the recognisable tang of feta. It is a strength three but milder than some of the others I try, with a creamy mouthfeel and a rounded, fruity finish. It’s made with both sheep and goat’s milk and packed in a plastic tub in brine, which keeps it moist and salty.
4/5
M&S Greek Feta
£3.25/200g (£16/kg)
A smooth and rich feta with a dense texture, a decent crumble and wonderful flavour development of ripened orchard fruits. This one reminds me how good so many summer fruits are with feta, from watermelon and peach to pear and fig. Made by the Roussas family, who seem to make a few of my supermarket favourites. The label says it is made with “100 per cent ewe’s milk” which makes it sound fancier than sheep’s milk but is exactly the same product.
4/5
Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference barrel-aged Greek feta
£3.50/200g/£2.60 with Nectar (£17.50/kg)
This feta shows that strength isn’t everything when it comes to flavour. It’s a sheep and goat feta with a strength of two, while most are three, and the taste is mild and smooth but instantly fruity and herbaceous with a zip of citrus, too. Texture-wise it is soft, almost spreadable. I’ll definitely buy this in the future.
4/5
Duchy Organic Greek Feta Cheese Strength Three
£3.15/200g (£15.75/kg)
This is very smooth and creamy, and blooms in the mouth with the fullness of great quality dairy and maintains its tasty, salty edge throughout. Made with organic goat’s and sheep’s milk and a touch of sea salt.
4/5
Odysea 100 Per cent Sheep’s Feta
£3.20/200g from Ocado (£16.00/kg)
This cheese is hugely creamy and tangy from the get-go, without being offputtingly strong. Made with sheep’s milk alone, it swerves some of the funkiness of goaty fetas and ends with a lovely bright lemony note. It crumbles really nicely, too. Made by third generation feta makers, the Roussas family, at their Thessaly dairy for Odysea.
4/5
M&S Simply Greek Feta
£2.35/200g (£11.75/kg)
I don’t love this at a first taste as it’s somewhat dry but it does settle into a decent option with a sharp and salty tang. Plus it has an impressive crumble to it when I sprinkle it over salad.
3/5
Ocado Greek Feta
£2.15/200g (£10.75/ kg)
A little slimy on opening but it crumbles beautifully and the mild flavour fluffs up in the mouth before quickly giving in to a fierce and salty tang. Great if you want a stronger cheese – this is strength three and made from goat’s and sheep’s milk.
3/5
Lidl Milbona Greek Feta
£1.69/200g (£6.76/kg)
This one tastes slightly powdery at first then rushes straight into a strong and salty tang. It doesn’t crumble too well, I expect because it’s a little too smooth and dense. Not awful, but I’d be more inclined to cook with this one.
2/5
Aldi Greek Feta
£1.69/200G (£8.45/kg)
Made with sheep’s and goat’s milk and no added salt, like the Lidl feta, this is incredible value. The flavour is mild to start off with then a good hit of tang kicks in, before a gentle finish. It is somewhat slimy when I open the packet, however, so might be nicer baked, certainly presentation-wise.
2/5
Waitrose No. 1 Barrel Aged Greek Feta Cheese PDO Strength Four
£3.90/200g (£19.50/kg)
If your feta comes in a plastic tub rather than plastic wrapping, this is your first sign it’s a superior product. This is marked as “strength four” yet initially tastes quite mild. But the flavour soon develops into something more interesting than the classic salty tang, with more of a ripe orchard fruits taste. Well worth the money.
4/5
Epiros Greek Feta
£5.25/200g from Ocado (£26.25/ kg)
Creamy, crumbly, sharp and tangy with real depth of flavour, I can see from a first taste why this Epiros feta is a prize-winning cheese and often named by experts. Georgina Hayden names it as one of her favourites and though it’s significantly more expensive than other fetas, it’s cheaper than high quality cheeses from the UK, France and Italy.
4.5/5
Tesco Greek Feta Cheese
£2.15/200g (£10.75/kg)
A good price for a feta that crumbles nicely and hits the palate with a velvety texture and significant salty tang. This is made from both sheep’s and goat’s milk and has a strength of three. It’s definitely one of the saltiest so a good choice if that’s your preferred kind of feta.
3/5
Lidl Simply Greek Style Salad Cheese
85p/200g (£4.25/kg)
This is the only feta pretender that I try, though they’re available in most supermarkets. It is made in the same way as feta but not in Greece nor necessarily with sheep or goat’s milk. In this case, it’s made in Romania. While the kind of milk isn’t specified, I suspect it is sheep. It tastes dry and then a bit sheepy, but with none of the character or tang I expect from genuine feta. I wouldn’t recommend this as a salad cheese but it’s a good source of protein (15g/100g) if you’re vegetarian, and would be fine if lacking in flavour when baked.
1/5