Poetry, Passion and Cheese

Over at Wensleydaleblog we have just published a poem by Ian McMillan, best known as the Barnsley Poet and a regular broadcaster with the BBC.
The poem is a further piece in the jigsaw that is the campaign for Real Yorkshire Wensleydale Cheese made in Hawes, Wensleydale in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales National Park. Anyway here is the poem:

TO MAKE WENSLEYDALE CHEESE...

You need Wensleydale weather and Wensleydale air
And Wensleydale skill and Wensleydale care;
You need a slight hint of magic in the Wensleydale breeze
To help make the wonder that's Wensleydale Cheese!

You need Wensleydale cows eating Wensleydale grass
Making Wensleydale milk with Wensleydale class;
You need Wensleydale sun shining down through the trees
To help make the wonder that's Wensleydale Cheese!

There's a Wensleydale crumbliness, Wensleydale taste;
Eat Wensleydale slowly, don't gulp it in haste!
You'll feel the delight from your tongue to your knees:
The wonder, the triumph, that's Wensleydale Cheese!

Now Yorkshire has glories, from Whitby to Tong
And they're all fantastic, so don't get me wrong
When I say the ultimate apex of these
Is the food of the gods they call Wensleydale Cheese!

Indeed, we have launched a competition now encouraging other bloggers to write their own poem in praise of the sacred cheese. Prize is a hamper of cheese and other goodies produced in the North Yorkshire Dales. Have a go!

This whole social marketing gig has been a real eye-opener. Wensleydaleblog has attracted a lot of traffic and the relationship we have with the Yorkshire Post and other media means that we are getting our message through more traditional channels. The trick now is to mash up the two together and that has started to happen.

Is it working? Well since we launched six weeks ago we have now more than 4,000 signed up to the petition in support of Real Yorkshire Wensleydale Cheese.