In the course of a somewhat varied career I have only met one woman who appreciated cheese. This quality in her seemed to me so deserving of reward that I did not hesitate to acquire her hand in marriage.
Another writer has said that "only gourmets among women seem to like cheese, except farm women and foreigners." The association between gourmets and farm women is borne out by the following urgent plea from early Italian landowners:
Ai contadini non far sapere
Quanta è buono it cacio con le pere.
Don't let the peasants know
How good are cheese and pears.
Having found out for ourselves, we suggest a golden slice of Taleggio, Stracchino, or pale gold Bel Paese to polish off a good dinner, with a juicy Lombardy pear or its American equivalent, a Bartlett, let us say.
This celestial association of cheese and pears is further accented by the French:
Entre la poire et le fromage
Between the pear and the cheese.
This places the cheese after the fruit, as the last course, in accordance with early English usage set down by John Clarke in his Paroemiologia:
After cheese comes nothing.
But in his Epigrams Ben Jonson serves them together.