People's Cheese 2026: Meet the Four Finalists Battling to Be Britain's Best New Cheese

There are cheese competitions, and then there's the People's Cheese competition. While the World Championship Cheese Contest and the American Cheese Society hand out medals judged by experts in lab coats, this one lets the public decide. A thousand people showed up at the Chiswick heat in May to eat, spit, argue, and vote. And now we have our four finalists for People's Cheese 2026: Britain's Best New Cheese.

These are not your supermarket cheddars. These are tiny-batch, artisanal, obsessive cheeses made by people who clearly spend more time with their curds than with other humans. Let's meet the contenders.

Lindley — The Raw Milk Wildcard

Jake Goldstein of Nottinghamshire's Primrose Creamery submitted a lactic cow's milk cheese made with raw milk. That alone makes it a controversial entry — raw milk cheese occupies a weird legal space in the UK, beloved by purists and feared by regulators. Lindley is soft, tangy, and tastes like the meadow it came from. If democracy has a flavour, it might be this.

Jemima Wild Filly — The Caerphilly That Ate a Garlic Farm

Alan Latter from Caws Pencw in Fishguard makes a Caerphilly-style cheese with wild garlic — and he uses pasteurised milk from his own herd of Jersey cows. The name alone earns points. But the cheese delivers: a crumbly, savoury Welsh classic infused with the most aggressively spring flavour known to humanity. It's a cheese that announces itself from across the room.

Tuppence — The Goat Button With Big Ambitions

Roger Longman at Whitelake Cheese makes a small yeast-ripened goat's button using unpasteurised milk from his own goats. Tuppence is tiny, yeasty, and dangerously moreish — the kind of cheese you tell yourself you'll have one of, and then suddenly the whole batch is gone and you're licking the paper. It's proof that small-format cheese can punch well above its weight.

Carreg Las — The Welsh Blue Coming for the Crown

Carwyn Adams at Caws Cenarth in Carmarthenshire makes a semi-hard sheep's blue called Carreg Las (Welsh for "blue stone"). This is the dark horse. Sheep's milk blues are rare — most sheep's milk goes into pecorino-style hard cheeses or Roquefort-ish crumbly numbers. Carreg Las is something else: semi-hard, spreadable, not too salty, with a blue veining that's assertive without being aggressive. It's Welsh, it's blue, and it's absolutely ready to win.

The final tasting happens on October 17, 2026 at Chiswick Cheese Market. The public can reserve a tasting box and judge alongside the panel. It's democracy, it's delicious, and it might just be the most fun cheese event in Britain this year.

My money's on Carreg Las. But I wouldn't be mad if Tuppence stole the show.