What is Camembert?
Camembert is a soft, creamy cow's milk cheese that originated from Normandy in France. Any cheese producer can label their product a Camembert but we do love the Camembert de Normandie, which is covered by the protected designation of origin (PDO).
Brie is a similar style of soft rinded cheese which can also be baked.
How to prep baked Camembert
- Whole Camembert more often than not comes in a wooden box wrapped in waxed paper. It's important to remove the paper then put the Camembert back into the wooden box for cooking.
- If you don't bake your Camembert in its box it'll just melt into a mess in your oven. If it doesn't come in one, put the cheese in a small, shallow dish or a Camembert Baker and keep an eye on it as it bakes. Once the walls start to bulge - it's ready.
- It's also important to use a small sharp knife to make several slits in the top of the Camembert cheese. This allows hot air to escape, otherwise the cheese is likely to overcook. The slits also allow you to flavour the Camembert to your liking.
What flavours should you use with Camembert?
You can flavour it with anything you want, from small sprigs of rosemary to sprinkles of za'atar. Some of our favourites include thyme, garlic, olive oil, chilli flakes, honey and black pepper.
Whatever it is, keep it simple with just one or two seasonings, and let the beautiful flavours of the cheese speak for itself.
Flavour your Camembert with
Thyme
Garlic
Chili Flakes
Honey
How to cook baked Camembert
Before cooking, tightly wrap the Camembert box in a sheet of foil to stop any melted cheese leaking out. Then put the cheese onto a baking tray at 200°C (180°C fan) mark 6 for 15-20min, until the Camembert cheese is melted inside.
You can check Camembert is ready by lightly touching the top. It should feel fluid and gooey inside, like a waterbed. If you cook the cheese for too long, it will go beyond the gooey stage and harden back up again.
Et voilà, now eat cheese!
25+ of the best cheese recipes
An experienced and highly skilled team of food writers, stylists and digital content producers, the Good Housekeeping Cookery Team is a close-knit squad of food obsessives. Cookery Editor Emma Franklin is our resident chilli obsessive and barbecue expert, who spends an inordinate amount of time on holidays poking round the local supermarkets seeking out new and exciting foods. Senior Cookery Writer Alice Shields is a former pastry chef and baking fanatic who loves making bread and would have peanut butter with everything if she could. Her favourite carb is pasta, and our vibrant green spaghetti is her weeknight go-to. Lover of all things savoury, Senior Cookery Writer Grace Evans can be found eating crispy corn and nocellara olives at every opportunity, and will take the cheeseboard over dessert any time (though she cannot resist a slice of tres leches cake). With a wealth of professional kitchen know-how, culinary training and years of experience between them, they are all dedicated to ensuring every Good Housekeeping recipe is the best it can be, so you can trust they’ll work (and if they don’t – we’ll have the answer for why*) every time (*90% of the time the answer is: “buy an separate oven thermometer”!).
