To do a Burton on the Cheese

You have invited guests over for dinner. Towards the end of the meal you pass the cheese board around the table. The first guest cuts the apex of all of the prime wedges of cheese and puts them on his plate before passing the board along.

As host you are somewhat disappointed on account of all the tastiest bits of cheese being at the centre of the round, which forms the apex of the wedge. There are always more veins there in a blue cheese and the apex is more creamy in a cream cheese. In a ripe cheese such as a well aged Camembert the centre tends to collapse and becomes runny. This part is the most prized by cheese connoisseurs.

You make a mental note to pass the cheese board around in the opposite direction next time this unsocial guest is present.

A diagram depicting the doing of a Burton on Cheese

Your guest instead of politely cutting along the length of the wedge, so taking a good balance of prime and less prime parts, performed "a Burton" and so inconsiderately took the best for himself, thereby depriving others present of some of the pleasures of cheese eating..

The term 'doing a burton on the cheese" or "to do a burton on the cheese" is believed to have originated in the South West of England. It may well also be an elaboration of the phrase "gone for a Burton". Gone for a Burton refers to someone who has died or an object which has been destroyed. In this case it may have been adapted to the specific context of meaning an act of destroying a wedge of cheese.