Good Cheese 2022-23

With the environment and sustainability in mind, we have taken this opportunity to rename our range of sixteen wonderful flavours. Each flavour has its own descriptive eye-catching packaging which is both recyclable and eco-friendly.

GIVEN THAT THE English language has a bigger dictionary than most other lingos, it’s slightly odd there isn’t a direct translation for ‘affinage’. Unless you work in the trade, this French term for maturing cheese – practiced of course by ‘affineurs’ is not necessarily something you would know.

While the skill of ageing and bringing on cheeses is not new in the UK, the idea of it being a craft in itself is novel. You can find out more about the art of affinage, and the UK’s inaugural Affineur of the Year competition (see page 11), in this very publication.

It just goes to show that when it comes to cheese, there is always more to learn and improve upon – whether you’re a maker,

INSIDE

COUNTER CULTURE 5

What’s new and what’s happening in the world of fine cheese

AFFINAGE IN THE UK 11

Could the inaugural Affineur of the Year competition be a sign that British producers are maturing in their approaches?

COUNTRY FOCUS: INDIA 14

Despite its size and the popularity of dairy, this country’s artisan cheese sector is only just getting started. Read the story so far.

a retailer or just an enthusiast (the English word for that one is ‘turophile’, by the way).

Before we commissioned our feature on Indian artisan cheese, I had no idea what to expect. But a resilient bunch of pioneers have found a way to blend ancient traditions, local flavours and European techniques (start reading our cover story on page 14).

It’s good to be pleasantly surprised. And you will find a few more heartening articles in this edition of Good Cheese. How about the former primary school teacher who developed an award-winning blue cheese in her kitchen? Or the small British producers that are showing the way for big dairy to become more sustainable? Maybe our sophisticated cheese & cider

SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTION

Meet some small UK cheesemakers with pioneering approaches

pairing session will make you think again about the potential for this combination.

And for those of you who just want to eat some cheese, you’ll hopefully find a retailer near you with our directory of UK retailers.

Michael Lane editor

21

TASTING: CHEESE & CIDER 27

A panel of experts road-tests a number of combinations with artisan-made ciders

MEET THE MAKER: TREFALDWYN BLUE 37

In the space of a few years, Clare Jones has gone from school teacher to producer – and her blue cheese is getting top marks across Wales

ACCOMPANIMENTS 39

Discover a host of chutneys, crackers and more to pep up your cheeseboards

FIND A CHEESE SHOP 43

Locate a cheesemonger near you with our comprehensive directory of UK specialist delis, food halls and farm shops

PUBLISHED

Hinds to hit the road after three decades at Neal’s Yard

On 25th November 2022, Jason Hinds hangs up his apron after 30 years at famed artisan cheesemonger, Neal’s Yard Dairy. He plans to spend the next 10 years travelling the world with his wife Caroline, but will remain a co-owner of the business.

The company’s sales director, a stalwart of British artisan cheese, joined the company in 1992, when it was one of the only outlets in the country championing independent cheesemakers.

It has since grown into an international supplier of artisan cheese, selling to high-end shops and restaurants around the world. Hinds has fulfilled his ambition to export the best British cheese around the world, opening markets including Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, most European countries, America, Canada.

Having received a French education, he felt strongly that he needed to convince France of the quality of British cheese when he started out in the 1990s. Despite the country’s historical resistance to foreign cheese, it is now Neal’s Yard’s second biggest market.

“The world is very different now,” he told FFD.“That’s a generation of consumers that are much more worldly wise, see beyond regional borders, see beyond national borders, are much more open-minded. They’re really interested now.’”

Back in the UK, artisan cheese has come into its own, too. He remembers that selling specialist cheese 30 years ago classed you as an outsider. “Raw milk cheese was a dirty word,” he said, seen

by the larger scale industry as a threat, and mostly unknown to the public.

“Now, there’s an acceptance of where specialist fits in the cheese landscape,” the World Cheese Awards being a good example, where the range of cheeses, judges and raders attending “shows how the different market sectors play a role.”

And whereas a career as a cheesemaker, a cheesemonger, or an exporter of British cheese, was “risible” then, it is now a legitimate career path.

“The people taking on the work that I’m doing are supremely talented. I feel like I’m handing it over to really amazing people who will take it on and develop it and add their own touch to it.”

“If they need my advice, I’m there for them. I’m not going to vanish.”

After discovering how to breed blue cheese moulds, scientists have now turned their attention to getting white moulds in the mood for procreation in a bid to create new strains that could “revolutionise” briestyle cheeses.

Penicillium moulds were long thought to reproduce asexually, but Paul Dyer, professor of fungal biology at the University of Nottingham, has discovered a way to naturally breed different strains of Penicillium roqueforti to create completely new blue mould varieties that produce unique flavours, textures and colours in cheese.

The process, which has been licensed by bio-tech start-up Myconeos, is now also being used to develop new strains of the white mould Penicillium camemberti, backed by a £285,000 grant from the Government-funded Innovate UK scheme. Scientists are currently hunting for wild strains of the white mould in dairies that they can crossbreed to create a range of new ripening cultures. myconeos.com

Grana’s got a brand new tag

The Grana Padano logo has received its first update since 1954. The new mark, which will feature on all packaging for the PDO cheese, has been redesigned to reflect a more modern style with its new font lettering.

Other changes to the packaging announced by The Grana Padano Protection Consortium include the indication of the ageing (12, 14, 16, 18 months) and the introduction of a new category “Riserva - Over 24 Months”. granapadano.it

IN BRIEF

An archaeological mission in Sakara, Egypt, recently uncovered vessels of cheese dating back 2,600 years. Inscribed with ancient writings describing the contents as “Haram”, the name of the white goat and sheep’s milk cheese before it became “Haloumi” in the Late Roman Egypt period, it is thought to be the second oldest cheese ever discovered. Another search in 2018 found a block thought to be 3,200 years old in a broken jar located in a high-ranking Egyptian official’s tomb.

Adventurous eaters may find Love Cocoa’s limited-edition truffles in their Christmas stockings this year. Founder James Cadbury said the Cheese Chocolate Truffles, a 55% dark chocolate shell and cream cheese ganache strike the right balance between sweet and savoury, balancing the richness of the dark chocolate with the distinctive flavour of cheese. RRP £13.50 per 150g tube. lovecocoa.com

After acquiring a 25% share of Italy’s Ambrosi group, formerly owned by Emmi, in June, the world’s largest dairy company Lactalis has signed a deal to buy fourth-generation family-owned Savoyard producer Verdannet. The raw cheesemaker is responsible for half of all Reblochon production, makes a fifth of the market’s Abondance, and a third of Tome de Bauges, as well as raclette and fondue blends.

As Good Cheese went to press, a new cheese shop was set to open in a former bookshop in Bristol. L’Affinage Du Fromage will be the first bricks-and-mortar site for online retailers Louise and Leo Wirtz –who have a background in dairy farming, cheese mongering and hospitality. As well as a selection of British cheese and accompaniments, natural wine, charcuterie and a range of essential items, customers will be invited to take part in events like cheese masterclasses at the shop. laffinage.co.uk

Scientists working on new strains of white mould

NEW CHEESES

Stilton specialist Long Clawson has launched a new brand of the iconic blue. Named after the brand’s founding year, 1912 Artisan Stilton is made with milk from Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, as per the terms of Stilton’s PDO. Noting that people rarely sit down to a cheeseboard at home, the company wants to encourage cooking with the Stilton, and has brought chef Marco Pierre White on board as a brand ambassador. clawson.co.uk

Devon cheesemaker Quicke’s has developed a twist on the classic territorial Double Gloucester. Its Smoked Double Devonshire clothbound cheese is available to retailers in 1kg and 1.5kg cuts, as well as in 200g pre-packed wedges. The orange-hued cheese offers up complex, buttery flavour which marries well with the caramel notes from the oak chips (also sourced from the Quicke’s estate) used to smoke the cheese. quickes.co.uk

Shepherds Purse has renamed its Feta-style cheese as Mrs Bell’s Salad Cheese. Originally called Yorkshire Feta and then Yorkshire Fettle, the company had to change the name for a second time after pressure from the Greek government, which argued that Fettle was too similar to the PDO-protected name Feta. shepherdspurse.co.uk

To mark its 225th birthday, Paxton & Whitfield has partnered with Cumbrian cheesemaker Martin Gott to develop and launch Cullum – a brand new British hard ewes’ milk cheese. Named after the founder of the market stall that came before Paxton’s first shop, Cullum is made at Gott’s Holker Farm during the height of milk production in the summer. Then, two weeks later, it is transferred to Paxton’s new maturing rooms in the Cotswolds. paxtonandwhitfield.co.uk

Long Churn Cheese in Austwick, Yorkshire, has created a soft raw milk cheese called Attermire, which is washed in Riggwelter ale. The new cheese, made with milk from a herd of just eight Dairy Shorthorn and Gloucester cows, is based on French and Belgian monastic cheeses. It has a pliant texture, plus brothy, malty flavours. The name comes from a local rocky landmark.

facebook.com/longchurncheese/

Morbier-style Ashcombe is named best of

British

A Morbier-style cheese called Ashcombe, made by King Stone Dairy in Gloucestershire, was named Supreme Champion at the 2022 British Cheese Awards .

The cheese claimed the title after some 500 cheeses were judged in a single day at The Bath & West Showground on 5th October, as the  Awards returned following a two-year hiatus.

Crafted on an organic dairy farm in the Cotswolds, Ashcombe was developed during lockdown to use up thousands of litres of milk that would otherwise have been poured away. David Jowett, who also produces the well-known washed rind Rollright, decided to use this milk to produce a larger, longer aging cheese.

Like the French cheese Morbier, Jowett’s creation is a large, flat, disc shaped cheese, with line of wood ash running through its centre. The rind is billed as meaty and savoury, while the paste offers aromas of warm milk and hay.

The Reserve Champion cup at the British Cheese Awards went to St.Jude, made by St.Jude Cheese in Suffolk.

Wheeled appeal

Ursula and Silvia Perberschlager, joint managers of London restaurant Le Gavroche, on the enduring appeal of the cheese trolley

Organised by The Royal Bath & West Society, the 27th edition of the British Cheese Awards saw over 500 entries judged in a single day, as the competition took place during The Dairy Show for the very first time.

Julius Longman, chairman of the British Cheese Awards, said: “We are truly delighted to have brought the British Cheese Awards back following a twoyear Covid-enforced hiatus. Cheesemakers faced unimaginable challenges during the lockdowns, forcing them to innovate in all sorts of ways to survive, and this is evident from the many new and interesting entries that won prizes at this year’s competition.”

three or four cheeses, but trolleys can easily cater to all taste and dietary requirements. Cows’, goats’, ewes’, hard, soft, runny, pasteurised, raw, vegetarian… They’re all there.

New artisan cheeses are introduced all the time, according to what is best that week.

That said, there are some cheeses that we can never leave out: a seven-year-old cheddar; French classics like Roquefort, Brie, Comté, Morbier and Époisses and a selection of British cheeses like Cornish Yarg, Tunworth, Lincolnshire Poacher and Single Gloucester.

Cheese trolleys, or, as they are known in French, ‘chariots à fromages’ are a mainstay at some of the country’s top restaurants. And ours at Le Gavroche is as popular as ever.

We may be a two-Michelin-star restaurant but our ‘cheese shop on wheels’ is famous and and still causes as much excitement in the dining room today as it did in the 1990s.

It provides theatre and instils a childlike wonder that never gets stale – but this is helped by our extensive and evolving selection of fine cheeses.

Where the cheeseboard reaches its limits, the trolley delivers. A board might feature

It’s not always the case in restaurants but, with the trolley, cheese is cut to order. So, it is served exactly as it should be, at the right temperature, with the right accompaniments (quince jelly triangles, fresh grapes, dried muscat grapes and oat cakes) and the right drink, which could be Port, Madeira, Cognac or wine – and not always red. Often it’s whites and sometimes sweet wines are the best partner.

It may be an extravagant treat for diners, and an expensive course to keep serving at the restaurant, but our trolley is still travelling across the dining room, and we have no plans to put the brakes on.

Andrew Gorman / The Royal Bath & West Society

Innovative pairings for the elevated cheeseboard

Britain is a nation built on cheese, we’ve been enjoying it since the stone age and no British dinner party is complete without the addition of a cheeseboard. Comté is the delicious, hard cheese from the Jura Massif that will elevate your status from cheese arranger to tastemaker.

A FOODIE FAVOURITE, Comté also pairs beautifully with a selection of unexpected accompaniments.

Gourmands don’t have to settle for bog standard chutneys and grapes. Why not tempt your guests with Comté and chocolate, Comté and cherries or Comté and chilli?

Comté boasts a range of flavours with some people able to taste everything from yoghurt to pepper. This makes it the perfect cheese to experiment with flavour combinations that will surprise even the most seasoned sampler.

Comté’s delicious flavour originates from the raw milk of the Montbéliarde and French Simmental cows of the Jura Massif in France, each with its own hectare of land to graze on. The cows eat grass and a wide range of plants and flowers out on the pasture in the summer, and locally harvested hay in the winter, producing high-quality milk that gives Comté its very special taste, scent, colour and texture.

Every single day, the milk is brought in from a collection of local farms and transformed into large 40kg wheels of Comté cheese by small village dairies, known as fruitières. These dairies use the skills and expertise of their ancestors to make sure each batch of the cheese is at its most perfect.

The wheels are then moved to local ageing

during the ageing process, regularly turning, salting and rubbing each one with brine solution for up to 24+ months. It is down to their experience and expertise to decide when the cheese is ready for consumption. The cheese’s taste is affected by everything from the altitude at which the cows were grazing and at what time of year.

As a result, every piece of Comté is different. Some have a firm, nutty texture and others a more floral flavour. Most importantly, every wheel is unique and deserving of its own special partner to bring out its unique taste.

Comté has been lovingly made for more than ten centuries. Farmers, fruitières and affineurs of the Jura Massif region of Eastern France produce the internationally popular cheese every single day of the year. It has AOC status, meaning it

been using to create the cheese exclusively in this region, integrating Comté into every aspect of community life.

If you would like to stock Comté and enjoy a slice of the potential profits of this unique cheese, head to http://www.comtecheese.co.uk/ are-you-a-cheese-reseller/ to contact us, as well as downloading promotional materials to support your sales.

If you would like to stock Comté and enjoy a slice of the potential profits of this unique cheese, head to www.comtecheese.co.uk/are-you-a-cheesereseller/ to contact us, as well as downloading promotional materials to support your sales.

CRAFTED IN SOMERSET SINCE

1833

Cheddar that is powerfully intense and complex with an exceptional depth of flavour. The slightly brittle and sometimes crunchy texture is a natural result of its long and slow ageing.

Ageing to perfection

UK cheese producers have always had a slightly different take on cheese maturation to their Continental counterparts. But the inaugural Affineur of the Year competition hints at a shift towards a more European approach attitude. PATRICK McGUIGAN explores the emerging culture of British affinage.

RENNET & RIND’S head of cheese Perry James Wakeman often comes up with secret nicknames for his cheeses. That might sound a little unusual, but if you spend weeks and months in a maturing room full of cheeses, you naturally get quite attached to them.

He became particularly attached to one 27kg truckle of Quicke’s cheddar last year, which he named Priscilla. “I don’t know why I gave her that name,” he says, laughing. “I suppose she was a bit of a diva and got special treatment, so it felt right.”

The reason why Priscilla was treated differently to other cheeses was because she was Rennet & Rind’s entry in the inaugural Affineur of the Year competition. Set up by the Academy of Cheese and Quicke’s in Devon, the competition saw 10 three-month-old Quicke’s cheddars sent to cheesemongers and makers across the UK, who matured them in different ways for a year. As well as Cambridge-based Rennet & Rind, participants included Brindisa, Neal’s Yard Dairy and Lincolnshire Poacher.

The extra attention lavished on Priscilla paid off because at the final in London in April, when all 10 truckles were blind-judged, she was voted the best tasting. Not just by the expert judging panel, but also by the audience, as part of a wider public vote. The cheese was widely praised for its grassy and buttery notes, plus a pronounced cheddar tang and long, savoury finish.

“You work away in the maturing room and get nice comments from customers, but to receive recognition from my peers like that was amazing,” says Wakeman. “It also confirmed to me just what an impact affinage can have on cheese.”

For the uninitiated, affinage means ‘to refine’ in French and involves specialist ‘affineurs’ buying young cheeses from dairies and ageing them to perfection. Time, temperature, humidity and airflow, plus the unique microflora of maturing rooms, are all important elements. So are techniques, such as turning, brushing and washing the cheeses. By controlling and combining these different factors, affineurs can take the flavour and texture of the cheese in different directions.

It’s a process that has a long history in France, but also Switzerland and Italy. However, in Britain, separate affineurs are not the norm. Cheesemakers tend to mature their own cheeses for various historical reasons, but this is changing. Cheesemongers Neal’s Yard Dairy, Paxton & Whitfield and IJ Mellis have all built new state-of-the-art maturing rooms in recent years, using them to improve quality and create new cheeses. Cheesemakers are also investing in maturation, including Westcombe in Somerset which built its own cheddar cave

You could say this new focus on affinage shows the British cheese industry itself is maturing.

Perry James Wakeman, Rennet & Rind

in the side of a hill at its farm, complete with a cheese-turning robot called Tina the Turner.

“You could say this new focus on affinage shows the British cheese industry itself is maturing,” says Wakeman, who has six separate maturing rooms, each with different temperatures and humidities. These were put to good use with Priscilla. “We wanted to maximise the potential of the cheese so it tasted like an 18-month cheddar at 12 months, but we also wanted to make it our own cheese,” he explains. “We disrupted the rind by brushing it hard so that the biome of our maturing room – the moulds and yeasts that are unique to us – could mount a hostile takeover. We also cranked up the temperature to speed up maturation, but then graduated it down to 8°C at the end.”

Wakeman’s affinage journey started five years ago when he took a course with prestigious French affineur and cheesemonger Mons. American cheese expert Susan Sturman, who lives in France and runs the English-language version of Mons’ affinage course with the company’s co-owner Laurent Mons, says there has been a surge in bookings from British makers and mongers in the past two years.

“It’s partly because the UK has been moving away from traditional territorial cheeses towards more soft continental cheeses that require more care and attention,” she says. “Brexit has also played a part. It’s harder to get products from the Continent and so the UK needs to be more self-sufficient.”

The week-long Mons Formation course comprises classroom learning and hands on work in the company’s maturing caves in Saint-Haon-le-Châtel in the Loire. The course also involves a full day following the life of a single cheese, either Fourme de Montbrison or St Nectaire, with students starting on the farm to learn about pasture, cows and milk, before heading to the dairy to make cheese, spending time in the maturing room and finishing up at a fromagerie.

“Affinage is all about improving the organoleptics of cheese: taste, texture, visual and aroma,” she says. “The transformation cheeses can undergo, especially soft ripened cheeses, in a short space of time is remarkable. They can very easily go to the dark side if they are not cared for properly. But get it right and affinage can make a huge difference to quality.”

Retailer and wholesaler Paxton & Whitfield is banking on as much after investing in five maturing rooms at its new headquarters in Gloucestershire. MD James Rutter says the move makes sense from a commercial point of view, enabling the company to improve quality and develop unique extra mature products, under the XO brand. But it has also enabled

THE ART OF AFFINAGE: THREE BRITISH CHEESES TO TRY

Cullum

A ewes’ milk cheese made by Martin Gott in Cumbria and transferred to Paxton & Whitfield’s maturing rooms at just two weeks old. It is rubbed with rapeseed oil and matured for several months until fruity and savoury.

Developed by Neal’s Yard Dairy in its maturing rooms in South London, Brunswick Blue starts out as Beenleigh Blue – a foil-wrapped ewes’ milk blue from Ticklemore Dairy in Devon. The foil is removed and the cheese aged in a different maturing room, so a natural rind forms, creating a creamier and more mushroomy flavour.

in brine to create a pungent rind. The result is supple, sticky and savoury.

Mary Quicke

the cheesemonger to work more closely with cheesemakers.

A case in point is Cullum – a new cheese created exclusively for Paxtons by Cumbrian producer Martin Gott as a way of using up the excess sheep’s milk he has in the summer. The retailer takes the cheeses at two weeks and ages them for up to 12 months. “Cullum is about taking the glut of summer milk and preserving it for the winter,” Rutter explained earlier this year. “That’s what true affineurs do on the Continent. They buy up-front and age it on. It’s good to be able to work so closely with cheesemakers and find solutions to problems they have.”

Mary Quicke says the experience of having her cheddar matured in so many different ways by other people has inspired her to launch inhouse trials tweaking time and temperature to see if it will improve her cheese.

“We don’t even have a word for ‘affinage’ in English, we have to use the French word, but it’s the obvious next step for British cheese,” she says. “It’s a way of demonstrating that what you do is really special, so people get more satisfaction in terms of flavour, but also the story behind the cheese.”

Quicke’s and the Academy of Cheese have already sent out 8kg truckles of cheddar ahead of next year’s Affineur of the Year contest, but are also expanding the event by delivering three other cheeses to contestants: Cropwill Bishop Stilton, Baron Bigod brie and the washed rind Solstice from White Lake.

Back at Rennet & Rind, Wakeman has already devised a plan for his truckle of Quicke’s cheddar, which involves inoculating the rind with moulds from three other clothbound cheddars. But the big question is whether has he given his cheese a name yet?

“I’m still considering it,” he says. “I want to wait a little longer so I can really get a sense of its true character.”

The final of Affineur of the Year 2023 will take place on 14 June. academyofcheese.org/affineur-ofthe-year

For more details on the Mons Formation courses, visit: makers-and-mongers.sturman. com

Brunswick Blue

Francis Dorset affineur James McCall takes a cows’ milk cheese called Stoney Cross, made by Salisbury-based Lyburn, and goes in a completely different direction by washing it

We don’t even have a word for ‘affinage’ in English, we have to use the French word, but it’s the obvious next step for British cheese.

IT’S TEA TIME. WITH EXTRA FLAVOUR.

Despite its size and love of dairy, India is not renowned for its cheese – save for its fresh varieties. But a new generation of well-traveled, small-scale producers is combining the country’s own ancient traditions with European techniques and adding more than a pinch of provenance.

AS FAR INTO the past as one can look back, India is and has indisputably been a dairy country. From the pastoral Indus Valley Civilization to the sophisticated food era in the Vedic times, milk and its derivatives were among the most important dietary elements in ancient India. Even now, the hold of Ayurvedic principles is strong – with the consumption of milk, ghee, curds and fresh cheeses like paneer holding an irreplaceable space in the home.

The Vedas describe a process of curdling milk by mixing it with a portion of soured milk, which is the ancient equivalent of adding starter culture in the making of acidcoagulated fresh cheeses. Cheeses formed through the technique of heat and coagulation can therefore be said to have existed in India for thousands of years.

The indigenous cheeses coming out of India today bear striking resemblance to those made by wandering pastoral communities of the past – by way of heating high-altitude milk derived from their flock, coagulation through acid or whey and treating fresh cheese curds, in the manner traditionally developed and made by their ancestors.

There is the stringy, stretchy Kaladi cheese from the Jammu & Kashmir region developed by the semi-nomadic Gujjar tribe, the sour Chhurpi made by Tibetan communities across the eastern Himalayan belt, the salty, crumbly colonial Portuguese-era Bandel from Bengal

and of course, the most popular of all: paneer.

But even as one of the world’s most significant milk-producing countries, India’s development of ripened, aged, rennetcoagulated cheese varieties has been distinctly absent. But there is a good reason: the concept of cheese ripening – amounting to a controlled rotting – violates the very deeply engrained tenets of food purity and hygienic food preparations preached by the Vedas.

The tropical heat and wet monsoons of the sub-continent hardly provided scope, especially in a pre-refrigeration era, to control maturation of milk-based products. Meanwhile, the use of animal-based rennet remains problematic in a country like India where animals are revered as gods – especially the cow. This is the primary reason why even the artisanal cheesemakers coming up in India today have shied away from using animal rennet, and maintain a strict code of using plant-based vegetarian enzymes to curdle their milk.

Despite the challenges, a new crop of artisan cheesemakers in India – largely trained in European cheesemaking techniques – is making waves with locally sourced, handmade and farmstead cheeses. These producers are well-traveled individuals, having lived abroad with plenty of access to fromageries, and they returned home to find a vacuum that needed addressing.

Mausam Narang Jotwani learned how to make cheese in the UK, and practiced it as a hobby before founding Eleftheria Cheese in Mumbai in 2016, specializing in fresh cows’ milk pasta filata cheeses like burrata, fiore de latte and straciatella. Eleftheria, along with other contemporaries like The Spotted Cow Fromagerie tapped into a new market, and has transformed the restaurant menu landscape: most high-end eateries in Mumbai now offer burrata salads on their menu. “Chefs were very excited about getting access to fresh cheeses in the city because they no longer had to wait a couple of days to receive it from out of town,” says Jotwani, adding that most creameries were previously in remote hillside towns with access to good dairy.

For prominent cheesemonger Mansi Jasani,

based on the isle of Bombay, the shift came naturally. “The new crop of cheesemakers made it accessible and available at a good consistent quality and price.

“It was also more of a lifestyle change that occurred during Covid, where people wanted to cook gourmet food at home and sought access to artisanal cheeses – which then opened up the avenue of selling directly to customers.”

Obvious as it may sound, seeking out high quality milk in the city was key to Jotwani being able to create these cheeses in an environment where Europeanstyle cheesemaking is still very much in its infancy. “Artisanal cheese, at the end of the day, is just milk,” she says. “Since cheesemaking happens at a much lower temperature than the usual milk consumed in homes, it becomes very tricky to explain that to the dairy farmer – you can’t give the cattle microbiotics, can’t inject hormones, the feed has to be of a certain quality – so it was a lot of education and knowledge sharing that went into acquiring high quality milk which paid off in the long run.”

By contrast, it was the daisy-strewn hills of the Himalayan Mashrobra valley that drew Indo-French couple, Debarati Nandee and Francois Laederich, to set up production there. Partnering with local villagers to source grass-fed cows’ milk, they developed a range of cheddar- and fontina-style Himalayan cheeses, aged on pine wood. Laederich stresses the importance of terroir, insisting that it is those flavours that make their product stand apart from the rest.

“Cows grazing on wild flowers and basil in the summer will be reflected in the taste of the cheese,” he says. “It will never taste exactly the same. As the seasons change, it will reflect the terroir of the grass eaten by the cows.”

Nandee adds the couple is not striving for their Amiksas brand to be in supermarkets, and they work very intentionally with retailers whose values are aligned. Major retailers

Cows grazing on wild flowers and basil in the summer will be reflected in the taste of the cheese

From left to right: Eleftheria’s burrata; feta; a selection including the Brunost that won Silver at the 2021 World Cheese Awards

in India charge high listing fees just to place the product on their shelves and have neither the wherewithal or the knowhow to handle, store or transport delicate artisanal cheeses. What they also lack is staff trained in cheesemongering to guide customers on their purchases. This has spurred plenty of cheesemakers to build their own distribution channels to sell their products.

Darima Farms in the Kumaoni hills of Uttarakhand similarly sources milk from single-cow households in villages around the hills, paying a premium to these farmers to boost the regional economy. They also employ and train young women from the region in the craft of cheesemaking, having consciously avoided hiring a foreign cheesemaker.

the pastoral Gujjar tribal community using their excess winter milk supply. Upon seeing the harsh living conditions of the Gujjars, a Dutchman named Chris Zandee set up a small factory outside of Srinagar, employing women from the Gujjar community to create their Kaladi, giving them a respectable source of income while helping to put their product on the map under the Himalayan Cheese brand.

Inspired by childhood memories of Kaladi kulcha (warm flat bread served with stringy fatty kaladi cheese) hot off a street cart in Jammu, Shria Abrol and her husband, Pranav Gupta, have similarly forayed into making hand-crafted kaladi using high quality locally sourced buffalo milk. They named their cheese after their family dairy brand, Surya Milk. “The texture of kaladi is a lot like halloumi and mozzarella”, says Abrol. “It’s stringy, stretchy and tastes rich in milk. As it ages, it also starts to acquire a harder exterior shell and a sour flavour profile, whereas the inside remains gooey and soft.”

Their efforts to promote Kaladi beyond the regional markets of Jammu have yielded a surprising new demand from upmarket chefs and restaurateurs, who always seek local indigenous ingredients to work with. “Markets in India have changed so much, chefs are so open to try something that’s handmade and artisanal.

They’re looking forward to local things, rather than just buying a pack of commercial mozzarella,” says Abrol.

In an interesting turn of events, India’s cheesemakers have begun evolving from and going beyond re-creating European style cheeses. Darima Farms, for instance, has developed a local spice-rubbed young cheese named Zarai. Co-founder Arvind Chawla says partner Pritam Bhatti came up with Zarai, a mix of gouda and montasio – a European hard cheese with a spice rub of fenugreek and mustard. It has subtle spice flavours which help develop notes of walnut.

In a similar vein, Eleftheria launched a Norwegian-style Brunost to incorporate all of the excess whey being generated at the fromagerie. The cheese went on to win a Silver at the World Cheese Awards. In comparison to the Norwegian Brunost, the one developed by Jotwani is said to be far more caramelised and deeper in flavour, just as would be preferred by Indian palates that are used to reduced milk peda, or fudge.

Käse Cheese, based in Chennai, is working with a goat herding community in Gujarat, having developed a range of artisanal cheeses to support the pastoral Maldhari community in Saurashtra.

The Farm, Chennai, has an impressive list of fresh, smoked, aged and bloomy rind cheeses named after local spots, like the Queso Coromandel and the Tomme de Semanchari, to signify provenance.

The Spotted Cow has also cleverly assigned names for its French cheeses, named after the isle of Bombay where it is based – the Camembay, Bombrie and Tomme de Bombai.

While Indian cheesemakers are employing the knowledge and techniques of the west, they are creating cheeses that are distinctively their own. The use of local milk that carries the flavour of the terroir, high quality Indian spices and herbs incorporated cleverly into the cheese, all create products that are not just European imitations.

Despite all of the positives, India’s burgeoning cheesemaking scene isn’t devoid of issues. As a whole, according to Jasani, the requisite ecosystem for producers to thrive is still lacking. Logistics and transportation are problematic, as European style cheeses are unsuitable for storage and cross country

The texture of kaladi is a lot like mozzarella. It’s stringy, stretchy and tastes rich in milk.

Amiska cheese is produced according to traditional French techniques in the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh, in the Himalayas

Award-winning cheese

At Snowdonia Cheese Company, we craft our award-winning range to perfection, using the finest natural ingredients to create outstanding textures and flavours.

INDIAN CHEESES TO TRACK DOWN

Zarai from Darima Farms in Uttarakhand. Cows’ milk, spice-infused, aged.

Bombrie from The Spotted Cow Fromagerie, Bombay. Cows’ milk, briestyle, bloomy rind.

Tomme de Semanchari from The Farm, Chennai. Raw cows’ milk, aged, Tomme-style cheese.

Also from The Farm, is Queso Coromandel. Buffalo milk, inspired by Spanish Manchego-style cheese.

Kaladi by Surya Milk, in Jammu. Buffalo milk, traditional regional stringy, stretchy cheese.

transportation in the country’s climate. It often costs more than the retail price of the cheese to transport it overnight. Not to mention the packaging itself being cost heavy, with ample gel packs for insurance, which nonetheless don’t assure safe cold passage. “What is the point of painstakingly making good quality cheese if it’s just going to get ruined during transportation or through bad handling?” says Jasani.

Problems with logistics are just the tip of the iceberg. Lack of access of good milk (which, when it is available, can only really be bought in industrial size vats), cultures and rennet, as well as gaps in education on how to manage, handle and treat cheese mean that the processed product industry stands a much better chance than artisanal producers do. “A small cheesemaker can’t even contemplate such an amount,” she says. Instead, the cheese industry needs to band together to create a more conducive atmosphere which can

Fontina style by Amiksa Cheese, semi-aged, milk made in Mashobra, Himachal.

Formaggio Kumaoni Blessings, Himachal. Asiago-style cheese, semi-aged, Manali, Himachal Bandel Cheese’s Whole Hog. Cows’ smoked, made Ode to Chennai cheddar-style crusted with South Spice Milgai Podi. Käse Cheese in

facilitate the progress of the various stakeholders.

Physicist-turnedcheesemaker Aditya Raghavan – who has helped develop cheeses for The Farm, Chennai and Begum Victoria, in says the problem is that India Fast-Moving Consumer Goods hold most of the market share.

“The customer is inundated brands and they much prefer to and-tested brands of processed cheese, like Amul, or at best an imported cheese for special occasions. It’s this cheese that brings them comfort.”

Artisan cheese remains a luxury good in a country like India. With rampant inflation and the high cost of quality milk, cheese is at best an indulgence affordable only for a small portion of the population of India. And, because the idea of aged, ripened cheeses

and the manner of their consumption is a high-brow activity, it’s still only the domain of those who’ve lived abroad or had regular access to international travel.

An average Indian, even one well-versed in food and cooking, is still largely unaware of cheese culture and remains oblivious to its nuances.

Yet, there is reason to hope, as more regional and city-based cheesemakers emerge, given the ever-expanding middle class and restaurant going culture reaching an all-time high. Perhaps cheese is on its way to becoming India’s new wine.

So far, there is still a simplistic mindset with regards to cheese here

Belper Knolle with Kerala black pepper, Himalayan pink salt and locally sourced garlic – made by Eleftheria Cheese, Bombay.

The Montasio produced by artisan cheesemaker Darima Farms, founded by husband and wife Arvind Chawla and Pritam Bhatti, is aged for three months with either chillies, garlic or a combination of the two

Small guys thinking big

From the fields through to the finished product, there are a variety of ways cheesemakers can alter their processes to counteract their environmental impact. TANWEN DAWNHISCOX speaks to some of the UK’s most cutting-edge operations.

IT MAY SHOCK readers of this publication to find out that not everybody loves cheese. In fact, looking at recent news stories about protestors descending on Central London retailers, you could say that some actively dislike it.

The activists who emptied bottles of milk on shop floors and over counters said they were taking “necessary action” – highlighting the environmental damage that production of dairy and other animal-based food causes.

The dairy industry as a whole certainly has things to be accountable for. Making cheese uses a lot of water and energy, and methane gas produced by cows is thought to be one of the main culprits for the rise in global temperatures.

While plenty of producers are now addressing these issues, there has been a good deal of environmentally sound trailblazing from smaller cheesemakers that they could learn from.

The Betts family, who produce Winterdale Shaw in Kent, have been making ‘carbon neutral’ cheddar for over a decade, and their operation has been low-impact for far longer.

“When we built our cheese dairy back in 2004,” says Robin Betts, “it was all built to be as energy efficient as possible.”

“I think we slipped into it by mistake in

some ways, in the fact that we wanted to do everything in the traditional way.”

The cloth-wrap used on cheese is biodegradable and plastic-free, plus, as any producer will know, the fresher the milk when the cheese is made, the more of its delicate butter fats are preserved and the better it will taste. So, at Winterdale, the milking process is done straight into the transport tanks to the dairy, then gravity fed into the cheese vats.

The cheese is then matured in a cave built under the dairy, which naturally maintains a temperature of 12°C year-round.

It didn’t take much more for the operation to become fully carbon neutral, as Betts realised when he reviewed the cheesemaking process in 2011.

“The only way that we were using energy, in any significant way, was that additional eight degrees raising of temperature,” he explains, so they installed a ground source heat pump to heat up the water and put 10kw of solar panels on the roof. From then on, the cheese was officially carbon negative.

By 2019, Betts had installed an additional 10kw of solar generation equipment, a small commercial wind turbine, 40kw of battery storage and a fleet of electric vehicles.

“So our whole transport, living, and the cheese is all carbon neutral,” he says.

Our whole transport, living, and the cheese is all carbon neutral.

Robin Betts, Winterdale Shaw

Tim Jones, Lincolnshire Poacher

sustainable approaches

Further north, Lincolnshire Poacher’s operation also runs entirely on sustainable energy, and has done since 2011, when the Government set out attractive incentives for farmers (Feed-In-Tariffs), and they installed a medium-sized wind turbine and solar panels.

These generate so much energy, in fact, that they sell some back to the grid –which, given the energy price rises many are experiencing at the moment, can only be a good thing.

“Electricity going up will cost us a little bit but relatively little because we’re not buying that much electricity in and we’re getting more now for our exported energy,” says owner Tim Jones. “When we bought the machine, we were getting 3p a unit for the electricity we sold, now we’re getting 12p.”

To heat the milk in the cheesemaking process and all the water on the farm, they also have two biomass wood chip boilers. Additional heating for the cottages, their office and packing room comes from a ground source heat pump installed in the late 2000s.

“They’re all doing their bit to mitigate our carbon usage,” says Jones, which is ultimately why they chose to invest almost £1million in renewables. “We talked a lot about what we could do, and being a farmer, you do have opportunities because you’ve got space and you can borrow money relatively easily.”

While Government incentives are harder to come by now, Jones says there is still scope for other producers to do the right thing.

“Most cheesemakers have the opportunity to put in solar panels or a wind turbine or something else, there are lots of projects that can be done. We all use lots of energy so certainly to counterbalance the arguments, the opportunities are there.”

Not all cheesemakers are farmers, but for those who are, tackling one of the main sources of controversy surrounding dairy farming and cheese production is to use by-products associated with methane gas production to generate energy, and this is what Mrs Temples cheese and Keen’s Cheddar farms do.

The Temples have had an anaerobic digester for 14 years, to process manure and whey from the cheese factory and waste products from their Norfolk farm. The methane produced is used to run an engine that generates enough electricity to run the farm.

On the family’s Somerset farm, George Keen says the waste heat from their digester, installed four years ago keeps the cows’ drinking water at temperature and heats their houses, as well as the dairy and cheesemaking facilities.

Benefitting both farms, waste products put through the digester yield good compost and liquid manures to be fed back onto the soils, cutting out the use of chemicals. Bearing in mind that a huge amount of the world’s fossil fuel use is from fertiliser production, this is a significant step.

The list of good practices goes on: regenerative farming, minimal tillage,

riverbank management, rainwater collection. All of these counteract its impact and yet, stereotypes still haunt the dairy industry. For Keen, this is partly because what is required of food producers now is different to what it was 50 years ago.

“When I was a young man, we were really producing as much food, as efficiently as we could on the land we had,” he says. “Now the emphasis has changed and we’re looking at soil science, wildlife, carbon capture, and a balance of the whole process.

“Life is a lot more complicated. You have to think about a lot more when you’re planning ahead, and I think it’s important that we use the knowledge that’s available now.

“We want to leave the world, our farm and cheddar cheesemaking in the best shape we can for the future.”

The reputational issues affecting the industry, he adds, are perhaps partly caused by the fact that producers are too gentle in spreading the word about what they’re doing.

“Marketing is a field that we’re not good at,” Keen says. “We’ve always relied on the product selling itself, but we do have to sell ourselves and what we’re doing on the farm.”

Lincolnshire Poacher’s Tim Jones agrees. “We’ve never made a big story out of it,” he says. “We just get on with it. Perhaps we and others are guilty of not making enough of it.”

Other producers have been more vocal. Like her father-in-law has done for several decades, Catherine Temple spends a proportion of her working life telling people – school children, young farmers, fellow producers and members of the public – how they run their farm in a circular fashion, and how others can take inspiration from what they do.

The Temples’ advocacy has been recognised by the local agricultural association, and earned them a prize for leading innovation in farming this year from the Aylesham Agricultural Association.

“We have a constant stream of visitors and invitations to speak and people wanting to ask questions,” she says. “I was giving a talk at an event on Saturday and people were genuinely thrilled to hear what is being done.

“People know so little about how their food is made that really all food producers need to be offering is some sort of education that is not greenwashing.

“Food producers need to address their communication skills. They need to let the public know that they are listening, and they are taking action.”

Policymakers need to involve themselves, too she adds, as “at the moment it’s been very much farmers against the Government, against the rewilders”.

No one wants to cry over spilled milk, but unless more in the industry make changes, we might find that we carry on doing exactly that.

winterdale.co.uk

lincolnshirepoachercheese.com keenscheddar.co.uk mrstemplescheese.co.uk

Producers need to let the public know that they are listening, and they are taking action.

Catherine Temple, Mrs Temple’s Cheese

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The picture shows Ruth Raskin, our Head of Cheese Quality and Care, in our cheese maturing rooms.

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Cheesemakers of Wales

The World Cheese Awards takes place in a different corner of Europe each year. It brings together hundreds of dairy industry influencers, whether they are judges, buyers, makers, affineurs, retailers, chefs, or food writers. This year the event supported by the Welsh Government takes place at the International Conference Centre Wales, Newport.

The World Cheese Market takes place on 2nd November, alongside the world’s most important cheese awards, the World Cheese Awards, at the International Convention Centre Wales, Newport.

You are warmly invited to discover:

• Welsh Food & Drink showcase and sampling

• Over 30 trade stands, including cheesemakers, affineurs and cheese accessories

• Young Cheesemonger of the Year, organised by the Academy of Cheese

• Watch the Super Jury decide the World Champion Cheese 2022

• Unparalleled dairy industry networking

Brookes Wye Valley Dairy www.brookesdairy.com

Castell Gwyn Cheese www.castellgwyn.com

Caws Cenarth Cheese www.cawscenarth.co.uk

Caws Penhelyg www.instagram.com/caws_ penhelyg

Caws Rhyd y Delyn m.facebook.com/ people/Caws-Rhyd-yDelyn/100076181974665/

Caws Teifi Cheese www.teificheese.co.uk

Cosyn Cymru www.cosyn.cymru

Dairy Partners (Cymru Wales) Ltd. www.dairypartners.co.uk

Defaid Dolwerdd en-gb.facebook.com/Holtham

Ewenique Dairy www.instagram.com/ eweniquespirits/

First Milk Cheese Company www.firstmilk.co.uk

Holden Farm Dairy www.holdenfarmdairy.co.uk

Mona Dairy www.monadairy.com

Pant Mawr Farmhouse Cheeses www.pantmawrcheeses.co.uk

Sanclêr Organic www.sanclerorganic.co.uk

Snowdonia Cheese Company www.snowdoniacheese.co.uk

South Caernarfon Creameries www.sccwales.co.uk

The Abergavenny Fine Food Co. www.abergavenny.uk.com

The Blaenafon Cheddar Co. www.chunkofcheese.co.uk

Trefaldwyn Cheese www.trefaldwyn-cheese.com

Y Cwt Caws www.ycwtshop.co.uk

Shakespeare

How do you like them apples?

Like beer, the artisan and craft scenes have grown rapidly in the last decade. And that makes this drink ripe for pairing with cheese. PATRICK McGUIGAN assembled an expert tasting panel to explore the possibilities. Photography by SEAN CALITZ.

WE’VE SEEN A revolution in the UK in recent years thanks to a new wave of exciting artisan producers, creating products steeped in tradition and terroir. And for once we’re not talking about cheese.

British cider has undergone its own remarkable transformation in the past decade. Where craft beer and natural wine led, ‘fine cider’ has followed with traditional cider makers being joined by new producers, who are finding success in restaurants and specialist shops. The parallels with the British cheese renaissance, which has seen artisan producers go on a similar journey, are hard to ignore, especially when for many people cider is the perfect pairing for cheese.

With all this in mind, Good Cheese

decided to unite the two by bringing together four experts at the Cider House in Borough Market to dig a little deeper into why cheese and cider are natural allies, and to find 10 killer matches across a range of cheese styles.

The afternoon starts with a discussion about British cider and why it works so well with cheese. Cider merchant Felix Nash sets the scene: “Fine cider, made on a small scale using craft skills and traditional fruit varieties, has really flourished in the past five years,” he says. “People are more interested in provenance and the fact it’s so different to the massmarket stuff. There’s been a rediscovery of something quite distinctively British.”

Cider-maker Mary Topp regularly holds cheese and cider tastings at her cidery in Hampshire. “My dad started making cider 35 years ago and used to come to events at

Borough to educate people about real cider,” she says. “Now we’re hosting corporate groups, hen parties and everyone in between.”

Cheese and cider are natural bedfellows, according to Sam Wilkin, who works closely with both cheese and cider-makers. “Cheese and wine is the accepted thing, but it’s actually hard to find one wine that will match a big range of cheeses. But cheese and cider sit so comfortably together. There’s acidity, fruitiness, tannins and they all seem to work in harmony.”

Lucy Wright nods along in agreement with Wilkin. She has long been a wine-lover, but started selling cider at Buchanans’ shop during lockdown. “There’s a lot of similarity between the wine and cider worlds in areas like acidity, tannin and terroir,” she says. “I’ve done lots of pairing with cheese and cider and they definitely work.”

8.3%

Sinodun Hill

Norton & Yarrow, Oxfordshire, England

Pasteurised

A match full of pure flavours to start things off. Wading In is a pétillant cider, made with 100% Egremont Russet using the ‘ancestral method’ (wild fermentation in a tank, finished in the bottle).

Lightly sparkling with floral and green fruit flavours, it is the perfect foil for Sinodun – a wrinkly rinded goat’s cheese with a whipped texture and mouth filling richness. “Egremonts are low in tannins and have a juicy acidity, so when you put the two together it creates a lovely tart, almost gooseberry flavour,” says Felix Nash. Sam Wilkin likes the textural contrast. “There’s a gentle fizz to the cider, but with the cheese it foams up and fills the mouth.”

Butford

5.5%,

Old

Roan Wensleydale

Curlew Dairy, Yorkshire, England

Raw cows’ milk, crumbly, cloth-bound

There’s a lot of love in the room for buttery, crumbly Old Roan. “This evokes childhood memories straight away,” says Mary Topp. “My dad would go to country shows with his cider and bring these kinds of cheeses back. It’s got such a lovely warm buttery flavour.”

Half the room loves the cheese with the medium sweet, naturally sparkling perry (made using the ancestral method), which is alive with citrus and floral notes. The other half isn’t so sure.

Lucy Wright is a lover. “Put the two together and it’s all light and twinkly and floral. This is a really lovely delicate match.”

Chair Patrick McGuigan agrees, casting the deciding vote in favour of the match.

Appellation, 2019

Find & Foster, Devon

8% ABV, blend

Manchego

Ojos del Guadiana, La Mancha, Spain

Raw sheep’s milk, hard

Everybody is in agreement about the next pairing. Made using the same ‘traditional method’ as Champagne, Appellation spends two years on the lees. Delicate aromas of honey, hay and green apples with a creamy mouthfeel, it increases the intensity of the Manchego, which after nine months of maturation has developed deep meaty notes, plus an interesting herbaceous quality.

“The cider really elevates the cheese and brings out a deep lanolin note that is amazing,” says Wright. Topp agrees: “I’ve gone on a real journey with that cheese. There’s an initial nuttiness, but then it went into a deeper flavour with lots of roasted lamb fat notes.”

Patrick McGuigan

Cheese expert and journalist Patrick led the tasting and recorded the comments for this article

Lucy Wright Operations manager at London’s Buchanans Cheesemonger, which supplies many of the city’s best restaurants

Felix Nash Founder of the Fine Cider Company and author of Fine Cider: Understanding the World of Fine, Natural Cider

Sam Wilkin An experienced cheesemonger and cider devotee, Sam runs Cellarman Makes, producing video content and podcasts for artisan food and drink producers

Mary Topp Director of New Forest Cider, which makes cider using apples from its own orchards. Co-owner of the Cider House in Borough Market

Wading In, 2020

Little Pomona, Herefordshire

abv, 100% Egremont Russet

goats’ milk, soft, yeast ripened

Gin Perry, 2021

Organics, Herefordshire

100% Gin Perry Pears

People are more interested in provenance and the fact it’s so different to the mass-market stuff. There’s been a rediscovery of something quite distinctively British.

Felix Nash, Fine Cider Company

Le Gruyère AOP

Imported by Käseswiss, Fribourg, Switzerland Raw cows’ milk, hard cooked

While the Comté was sweet and nutty, the 18-month Gruyère is a much beefier proposition full of brothy, umami depth, plus notes of roasted onions and exotic fruits. After much mixing and matching, the smoky, toffee apple notes of Tamoshanta is declared a perfect pairing. Pilton uses a process called keeving to retain natural sweetness in the cider, before it is aged in Scotch whisky barrels, which helps develop the oaky, smoky notes.

“Oh yes, that definitely works for me,” says Topp. “There’s a crunchy savouriness in the cheese that is really emphasised with the cider. It feels special – salty, sweet and lovely,”

Nash waxes lyrical about the “plummy berry notes” in the cider, while Wilkin likens the match to sitting in a “big leather arm chair next to a big log fire.” A real crowd pleasing combo.

Kingston Black, 2020 Wilding Cider, Somerset 4.3% ABV, 100% Kingston Black

Gouda Cono Kaasmakers, Westbeemster, Holland Pasteurised cows’ milk, hard, waxed

“This is a remarkable cheese,” declares Topp. “I didn’t realise Gouda could be so intense and have such big, bold, complex flavours, so it really needs something that can stand up to it.”

Step forward Kingston Black, made with fruit from five 35-year-old trees, which has toffee apple, stewed plum and plum notes framed by acidity and tannins. It more than holds its own against the 42-month cheese.

“The sweetness and the weight of the cider really meet the cheese head on,” says Nash. “This is a bold pairing.”

Cheddar On My Mind, 2021

Cellarman / Oliver’s Fine Cider, Herefordshire 6.8% ABV, Yarlington Mill and barrel-aged varieties

Westcombe Cheddar Westcombe Cheese, Somerset, England Raw cows’ milk, hard, cloth-bound

If one cheese is a natural fit for cider, it’s cheddar. Sam Wilkin is so taken with the match that he has worked with Oliver’s to create a cider specifically to drink with the cheese. Cheddar on My Mind is made by blending barrel aged ciders, adding sweetness with a keeved cider and sparkle through carbonation.

His efforts are well-received by the other panellists.

“The cheese becomes like hot buttered crumpets with marmite in my mouth when I take a sip of the cider,” says Nash. For Wright, the cheese and cider “flowed together so smoothly.”

Wild Ferment Rolling Blend Perry

Oliver’s Fine Cider, Herefordshire 6%, blend of pears, including Blakeney Red, Red Pear, Red Longdon, Gin and Butt

Parmigiano Reggiano La Villa, Parma, Italy Raw cows’ milk, hard cooked

This delicate, sparkling perry is a surprise hit with the 24-month Parmesan. On paper, the intensely savoury cheese should have been too much, but the bubbles refresh the palate and bright pear and rhubarb notes bring out the fruitiness of the cheese.

“I think it’s amazing that something so delicate can work with such a strong cheese,” says Nash. “The perry takes the cheese in different directions,” highlighting the cheese’s fruity notes and savoury base. Wilkin is also a big fan, “It’s taken me back to the taste of lip balm and sweets when I was a child.”

Stoke Red, 2020 Wilding Cider, Somerset 3.8%, 100% Stoke Red

Langres

Schertenlieb, Haute-Marne, France Raw cows’ milk, soft, washed rind

A moment of quiet reflection hits the judges as they mull over the combination of ripe, oozy Langres and Stoke Red cider. Then everyone begins talking at once about how much they love the red fruit flavours and bright acidity of the cider with the yeasty, lactic Langres.

“There’s fruitiness in both cheese and cider and when you put them together it turns the volume up even more,” says Wright, noting raspberries and strawberries.

“The bubbles are cutting through the creamy layer beneath the rind, but there’s also a lactic tang to the cheese in the centre, which is mirrored by the cider. This is a standout match.”

There’s a lot of similarity between the wine and cider worlds in areas like acidity, tannin and terroir

Lucy Wright, Buchanans Cheesemonger

My dad used to come to events at Borough to educate people about real cider. Now we’re hosting corporate groups, hen parties and everyone in between.

The Mayflower – Fourth Voyage in Uncharted Territory, 2020

Oliver’s Fine Cider, Herefordshire

7.8% ABV, blend including Yarlington Mill, Dabinett, Michelin, Catley Red, Foxwhelp and Redstreak

Époisses

Gaugry, Côte-d’Or, France Raw cow’s milk, soft washed rind

The Époisses that hits the table for the next pairing has a brick-coloured rind, sticky and pungent with powerful aromas of farmyard and smoked fish, while the paste is rich and oozy. Finding a cider to take on such a big cheese isn’t easy, but barrel-fermented and aged Mayflower, which is sweetened with ice cider, is (just about) equal to the task.“The smell from this cheese is intense – it’s like Copydex glue, seashells and spicy peanuts,” says Nash. “But there’s enough woody and ripe fruit notes in the cider to handle it.”

New Forest Cider Medium

New Forest Cider, Hampshire

7% ABV, blend

Pevensey Blue

Pevensey Cheese Company, East Sussex, England Pasteurised cows’ milk, soft, blue.

Mary Topp has brought a bottle of her own cider to the tasting, which turns out to be a firm friend to various different cheeses, but especially to our final choice: Pevensey Blue.

“There’s a biscuity sweetness to the cheese, which is picked up by the sweetness of the cider and the saltiness of the cheese smooths out the tannins,” says Wilkin.

Nash likes the way the fruity quality of the cheese is heightened by the cider.

“It’s bringing out pear and orange notes that I really like. This is a very, easy uncomplicated match.”

Mary Topp, New Forest Cider

SPAIN’S LOVE OF sheep’s milk cheese is legendary. And nowhere is this truer than Castile and León, the country’s biggest producer of sheep’s milk. The region is famous for traditional cheeses, such as Zamorano and Castellano.

While these classic cheeses are uniquely ingrained in the region’s food culture, there is still room on the cheeseboard for other styles and flavours. Castile and León is also the country’s second largest producer of cow’s milk and in the top five for goat’s milk – a dairy culture that is reflected in innovative mixed milk cheeses.

Combining milk from different species is a rarity in the UK, where cows rule the fields, but the method has a proud history in Spain, stretching back to when small farms would mix milk from different animals until they had enough to make cheese.

Queso Iberico, made with cow, sheep and goat’s milk, is one of the most popular mixed milk cheeses in Spain, and is an important product for El Gran Cardenal in Medina del Campo, Valladolid. The family company makes two types: ‘semi-curado’ (aged two to four months) and ‘curado’ (four to six months).

“There is a tradition in Castile and León of making mixed cheeses to expand the range for consumers,” explains Joaquin Buch, export manager. “Mixed cheeses cater to consumers who do not want flavours or textures as strong as

those of sheep’s cheeses. Cow milk cheeses have flatter flavours, but by adding a mixture of sheep and goat it creates cheeses with a character that is easier to eat.”

El Gran Cardenal also makes a range of cow and sheep’s milk cheeses, which are simply known as Queso Mezcla (Mixed Cheese), made with fresh milk at a percentage of 60% sheep and 40% cow. They range in age from one to eight months.

Key to all the cheeses is the quality of the milk, says Buch. “Our milk is 100% natural milk, collected every day in the surroundings of our cheese factory. Sheep’s milk provides a pronounced taste and drier texture, which is accentuated with ripening. Goat’s milk gives the product more whiteness and a very characteristic flavour with hardly any maturation. Cow’s milk unites the two giving cheese a creaminess.”

Quesos Cerrato is another cheesemaker in the region with a proud history of mixing milks to make cheese. Set up in Palencia in 1968 as a farm co-operative, the group became part of Agropal in 2006 – one of Spain’s largest co-operatives, comprising farms that rear livestock for dairy and meat, but also grow cereals and other crops. The company’s cheeses include Cerrato Umami, which is a blend of cow and sheep’s milk. Careful maturation is essential to achieve a harmony between the two milk types and create complex savoury flavours.

“Cerrato Umami spends at least eight months in our maturation rooms, where temperature, humidity and ventilation are carefully controlled,

and they are subjected to periodic turning to achieve greater uniformity,” explains marketing manager Elena Rodríguez.

The search for new flavour profiles in Castile and León goes much further than mixing milks. Cheesemakers have also developed a new generation of flavoured cheeses with the addition of ingredients, from truffle and paprika to saffron and chocolate.

Queserías Chillón in Toro, Zamora, has pioneered several new flavoured cheeses, including spreads or ‘emulsions’ flavoured with honey or paprika. It also makes a hard sheep’s milk cheese with 5% Toro red wine, which is then submerged in vats of wine for 15-20 days,

Mix and match

Castile and León is famous for traditional sheep’s milk cheeses, but cheesemakers are also mixing things up by combining different milk types and creating innovative flavoured cheeses

WHERE TO BUY IN THE UK

Bayley & Sage: bayley-sage.co.uk

Iberica: ibericafood.com

Mevalco: mevalco.com

plus a cheese aged in Iberian pig lard for several months. This final cheese has a long history in the region, says MD Gustavo Chillón Lorenzo, who explains that his great-grandparents used to use a similar technique at the end of the 19th century to preserve their cheeses on the journey to markets in the north of Spain.

“In this region, good local products have always been tasted together for centuries,” he says. “Cheese and wine, grapes and cheese, honey and cheese, pork fat with wine and cheese. Combining these products and their flavours in a single cheese is a natural evolution.”

Chillón is by no means the only company in the region that is exploring the possibilities of flavoured cheeses. Lácteas Zamoro in Santibáñez de Vidriales, Zamora, is well known for making aged, raw sheep’s cheeses, but it also creates cheeses coated in rosemary, lard and extra virgin olive oil. Three years ago it introduced two other variants, made by adding 5% black truffle or black garlic to cheeses which are matured for at least eight months.

“The main asset our company has is the

cheese itself,” says export manager Eduardo Hernandez Gabriel. “It’s a special cheese that is the result of an exhaustive milk selection. The company manages its own co-operative and milk comes from Churra and Castellana sheep. Our company also has a quality department that analyses all the milk and this permits us to achieve a regularity and homogeneity in the cheese.”

Moncedillo in Campo de San Pedro, Segovia, makes semi-soft, raw sheep’s milk cheeses that are coated in La Vera paprika or have pieces of black truffle added to the curd before maturation.

“Castile and León has always been quite conservative, but about 12 years ago there was a cheese revolution where the fear of adding flavours was lost,” says director Joaquín Manchado. “With the rise of fusion foods, people understood that it was possible to do different, more modern and exquisite things in cheese.”

Quesería la Antigua in Fuentesaúco, Zamora has taken the idea of fusion food to remarkable new places. It’s range includes sheep’s milk cheeses flavoured with everything from saffron to chocolate. The secret to success is achieving harmony, explains export manager Marío García.

“Balance in the cheese is a combination of patience and hard work,” he says. “Cheeses

must be under very controlled conditions in the ripening rooms. We control temperature and humidity, we always keep an eye on the different batches and also we control air flow. When you put all that together, the result is a team of people caring for every single wheel, creating a cheese you simply want to eat.” elgrancardenal.com quesoscerrato.com quesoschillon.es lacteaszamoro.com moncedillo.com queserialaantigua.com

Gran Cardenal, Quesos Cerrato, Lácteas Zamoro and Quesería La Antigua belong to Queso Castellano PGI www.jcyl.es

For more information, contact: promocion.ice@jcyl.es

El Gran Cardenal Queso Ibérico

Made with a mix of pasteurised cow (40%), sheep (40%) and goat’s milk (20%), El Gran Cardenal’s Queso Ibérico comes either ‘semicurado’ or ‘curado’. Creamy, nutty and herbaceous.

Cerrato Umami

A mixed cow and sheep’s milk cheese, Cerrato Umami is aged for at least eight months to develop intense savoury flavours.

Chillón Oveja con Vino

The paste of Queserías Chillón’s raw sheep’s milk cheese is enriched with 5% Toro red wine, before being submerged in more wine for up to 20 days. Savoury and fruity.

Ciudad de Sansueña con Ajo Negro

A thermised sheep’s milk cheese, made by Lácteas Zamoro, which is flavoured with black garlic paste. Aged for at least eight months, the mature cheese is a good foil for the fragrant caramelised garlic flavour.

Moncedillo Red Dusted with bittersweet Pimentón de La Vera paprika, this semi-soft raw sheep’s cheese from Moncedillo has a smoky and fruity flavour.

La Antigua Queso Curado con Azafrán  This hard raw sheep’s milk cheese from Quesería la Antigua is infused with PDOprotected Karkom saffron strands from La Mancha and aged for six-months, giving a distinctive hue and flavour.

Three years ago, Clare Jones was a primary school teacher. Now, she is officially the producer of the best cheese in Wales – the creamy blue Trefaldwyn. She tells TOM VAUGHAN all about her journey from the classroom to the dairy.

ALMOST EVERYBODY SHE meets asks the owner of Trefaldwyn how and why she switched from teaching to making cheese.

“I’m not from a farming background,” says Clare Jones. “I don’t live on a farm. I’ve got no farmers in my family. I just wanted to do my own hours and be my own boss.”

Three years on from making that first batch of cheese on her kitchen table, Jones is living out the Great Resignation dream: her creamy blue cheese – named after the old Welsh word for her hometown of Montgomery in Powys – has since won a bronze in the Artisan Cheese Awards, a Great Taste two-star and a Gold at the World Cheese Awards, where

it was also named Best Welsh Cheese. It’s a meteoric rise by any cheesemaker’s standards, let alone someone who prior to 2019 had never stepped foot in a creamery.

“I wanted a better work-life balance,” she says, reflecting on her career change. “I wanted to run my own business and my husband and I were thinking about what I could do. In Montgomery there’s already a brewery, a couple of vineyards, a bakery,

and a guy that produces Wagyu beef, but there was no one doing cheese. So I thought: ‘Maybe I could fill that gap.’”

Jones bought a few cheesemaking books, did some reading and had a go at making a blue cheese. She soon realised that she needed a bit of tuition, so signed up to a course at The Courtyard Dairy, near Settle, Lancashire, where she found herself amongst a class of interested hobbyists, all under the watchful eye of expert cheesemaker Andy Swinscoe. “I was the only one that had gone there with the idea of running a business and I think he [Swinscoe] looked at me and thought: ‘really’?”

The crash course gave her the confidence to try again. “I came home, had another go, and it was much better. I gave that to friends and family and they said: ‘This is really good. You should go for it.’”

The choice of starting with a blue cheese was partly down to taste, but mainly a savvy

Simon Regan

Trading chalk for cheese

business decision. “Blue cheese is one of one of my favourites and from a business point of view, it can command a higher price. It’s more of a luxury item than your standard cheddar. It also only takes about a month to mature, whereas if you want a really nice cheddar in can take 12 months. So once you’ve made the cheese, you’ve got no idea what it tastes like until a year down the line when it’s ready. Whereas when I was developing my recipe, I could taste it after a month and tweak it accordingly.”

Jones had the outline of a recipe. She had the fledgling skills. But she lacked the facilities to make her new cheese. So she began looking for Government support, and found a huge lifeline in Project Helix, an initiative kickstarted by Food Innovation Wales in 2016 to help Welsh companies develop new products. So far, it has worked with 380 businesses and 940 individuals, had an economic impact of over £185m and facilitated the creation of 1,240 new products, of which Trefaldwyn Cheese is one. “It’s run with the help of three food centres – in Cardiff, Cardigan and Anglesey,” says Jones. “You can go there and hire a commercial-grade room with commercial-size equipment, and you have a food technologist on hand. It is absolutely fantastic.”

By a stroke of divine luck, the food technologist that Jones found herself paired up with at the Food Centre Wales in Cardigan was cheesemaker Mark Jones, creator of Tysul Blue – itself the recipient of a gold at the International Cheese Awards in 2019. Together, they continued the development of Jones’ kitchen-table creation. “I took this recipe along to Mark and said: ‘This is what I’ve got.’ It was a bit from this book and a bit from that book – I’d just kind of made it up. He helped me tweak it and got it to a stage that it was ready to go to market. And I had that all of that support and advice for free!”

For each batch, Jones uses 500 litres of milk sourced from a local consortium of dairy farmers, which produces 30 2.5kg cheeses, retailing at between £30-£34 a kilo. Word spread quickly about the creamy, golden-coloured blue with a bold but

overpowering flavour, once she launched it at Montgomery Christmas Market in 2019. Two wholesalers came on board early – Blas Ar Fwyd and Ultracomida – and Jones also sells direct to 15-20 delis and restaurants in the Welsh Marches.

What does she put the cheese’s popularity down to? “I think it’s got a

Cheese Awards and Best Welsh Cheese? It’s crazy.”

Presently, supply far outstrips demand. Jones pays the Cardigan Food Centre Wales to use its facilities, but it is so busy that she is only able to make twice a month. “Ideally, I’d be making at least every week, and I still wouldn’t have enough.”

While the Cardigan Food Centre has been pivotal to Trefaldwyn’s development, it entails a four-hour round trip for Jones, four times a month. “The first step is a two-day process. I make it, it goes in its moulds, it drains overnight and then I go back the next day to add salt. Then a week later I have to pierce it to allow the air to get in and react with the blue mould, which creates the veins.”

Jones is keen to find premises of her own in Montgomery. While she has taken the business this far without huge overheads, acquiring her own premises will require a significant outlay, which is why she has been putting it off. “It’s daunting. It’s working out how much that initial outlay is going to be and what it’s going to be in. Is it going to be in a unit on an industrial estate? Am I going to partner up with a farmer and rent some premises from them on their farm? It’s trying to find which one is best for the company. The goal is to bring it back to Montgomery and hopefully this time next year I won’t be driving across Wales every week.”

nice balance. It’s strong enough blue that you know you’re eating a blue cheese but it’s not going to knock your socks off. I think the quality of the milk helps with the creaminess. And I think people like the fact that it is still done by hand rather than mass-produced in a factory. I’m there stirring with a paddle for an hour, which is tiring, but it means I’ve got a better sense of the cheese and when it’s ready.”

The industry has been as impressed by Trefaldwyn as consumers, and Jones admits to being shocked by the slew of awards it won last year. “I couldn’t believe it. A 2-star at the Great Taste awards. Gold at the World

Beyond finding a permanent home, Jones has other ambitions for the business. “I hope it’ll be big enough to be employing some people, and I can move into a more managerial role. And it’d be nice that it’s established enough that it can have another product – ideally I’d like to try another style of cheese.”

If her next creation is half as popular as her blue cheese, Jones will have a formidable business on her hands – all of it proof that it is possible to create world-beating product without a huge investment, just a lot of hard work. “I think a lot of people don’t take that first step. I just thought: ‘What have I got to lose? Why not give it a go? You only get one life, don’t you?’”

trefaldwyn-cheese.com

Blue cheese is one of one of my favourites and from a business point of view, it can command a higher price.

I think people like the fact that it is still done by hand rather than mass-produced in a factory.

Simon Regan

Charlotte would say that fresh, high-quality ingredients, mastery of traditional methods and great attention to detail are what makes the difference. Her new Fig and Pear Chutney is the perfect pairing to a surprisingly wide range of English and Continental Cheeses, particularly the mild soft ones that can be so hard to match

Strike a match

For many people a cheeseboard is not just about the cheese. So, if you like a little extra or are after a new pairing, this selection of accompaniments should whet the appeitite.

Celebrating the sunshine flavours of the Mediterranean and Middle East, Cypressa has launched a range of pastes and tapenades, including a vegetarian Aubergine & Feta Mezze, a smooth, creamy blend of roasted aubergines and the famed sheep’s milk cheese, to pair with other cheeses, say, on Dakos – a Cretan meze consisting of barley rusk soaked in olive oil, topped with vegetables and cheese. cypressa.co.uk

This Apricot & Ale Chutney (200g) from GingerBeard’s Preserves is made with Southville Hop IPA from Bristol Beer Factory. With a delicate, slightly tart hit from the apricots and plump, juicy raisins, the chutney is a good all-rounder but pairs particularly well with rich, creamy cheeses. RRP £4.00.

gingerbeardspreserves.co.uk

By adding jalapeño and garlic to its Red Onion Relish, The Garlic Farm has created a batch of tangy, medium-heat relish that adds a adds a hint of chilli to the classic pairing. RRP £4.50. thegarlicfarm.co.uk

These two new chutneys from Galloway Lodge were created especially for Christmas. The Apple & Cranberry recipe was developed to match with soft, mild cheeses while The Pear & Spices take has the strength to stand up to more intense, sharper flavours. RRP: £3.50. gallowaylodge.co.uk

Stored in a blend of oil, garlic, basil and oregano, Odysea’s Semi-Dried Datterini Tomatoes will add a burst of flavour to any cheeseboard. Meaning ‘little dates’ in Italian, the Datterini are vineripened before being semi-dried to intensify their sweetness.

odysea.com

Winner of a Great Taste 1-star this year, the Sweet Chilli Jam from Just Like Mumma’s is made in small batches using fresh chillies, red peppers, garlic, ginger and smoked paprika. Developed to gently warm your tastebuds without blowing your head off, the jam can supplement a selection of chutneys on a cheeseboard or substitute them in a ploughman’s sandwich. justlikemummas.co.uk

Bristol’s independent family-run business Single Variety Co is selling gift boxes of four single-variety chilli jams, using varietals ranging from the mild Fireflame to the super-hot Orange Habanero, as well as classic Jalapeño and Orange Habanero chillies. These will tick boxes for cheese lovers and adventurous eaters alike. RRP: £22.50. singlevariety.co.uk

New from Roots & Wings Organic is a range of Organic Seeded Biscuits made with sesame, nigella, caraway and fennel seeds, butter and cheddar. Available in three flavours – Original, Fennel and Chilli – the biscuits can be bought in single or selection packs of three, alongside the producer’s new range of MultiSeed Brittles. RRP: from £3.65 and £11.95 respectively. rootsandwingsorganic.com

Last year, Rosebud Preserves’ Damson Fruit Cheese earned a Great Taste 3-star. This year, the producer’s new Greengage Fruit Cheese won another. The fruit is sourced from a single orchard in Cambridgeshire, and cooked with unrefined cane sugar and a hint of fresh lemon juice. The preserve is said to work particularly well with blue cheeses. RRP £5.50 per 113g jar. rosebudpreserves.co.uk

Within 12 months of opening, The Artisan Man’s takeaway catering business has earned a 1-star award from Great Taste for its Tomato Chutney, developed with local ingredients to use in its own cheese and ham sandwiches. Finely balancing sweetness and acidity, this small-batch, preservative-free product will amp up a cheeseboard, sandwiches and toasties. facebook.com/TheArtisanMan

A double gold winner at the Cheese Board Awards 2022, this Christmas Chutney from Radnor Preserves also walked away as the overall Champion Chutney. Made with seasonal pomegranates

. radnorpreserves.com

Small family business Sugar and Chic has developed a selection of artisan chutneys and jams to pair with a variety of cheeses. Among them are Apple Pie Jam, Blackberry & Port Jam, and Pear, Date & Sultana Chutney, which the producer says have been highly praised by their cheese-loving customers. All are available as single jars or as part of the company’s own curated gift packs.  sugarandchic.co.uk/artisan

and cranberries, dates and apricots, it is described by the producer as a delicious rich chutney that is particularly perfect for those Christmas Cheese Boards

www.deans.co.uk

Baked with extra mature cheddar for an intense cheese flavour, our savoury bites are perfect to enjoy with a glass of wine. WWW.HAWKSHEADRELISH.COM

www.odysea.com

Find a UK cheese counter near you

EAST ANGLIA

CAMBRIDGESHIRE

C A Leech & Son Royston leechandsons.com

The Gog Cambridge thegog.com

The Larder at Burwash Manor Cambridge burwashlarder.com

ESSEX

H. Gunton Colchester guntons.co.uk

The Village Delicatessen Colchester

NORFOLK Old Hall Farm Bungay oldhallfarm.co.uk

SUFFOLK Friday Street Farm Shop Saxmundham fridaystfarm.co.uk

Slate Cheese Aldeburgh & Southwold slatecheese.co.uk

The Grundisburgh Dog Delicatessen Woodbridge grundisburghdog.co.uk

The Black Dog Deli Halesworth blackdogdelifoods.co.uk

LONDON

Bayley & Sage Battersea, Belgravia, Chelsea, Chiswick, Clapham Junction, Fulham, Parson’s Green, Wandsworth & Wimbledon Village bayley-sage.co.uk

Buchanan’s Cheesemonger St George’s Fields buchananscheesemonger.com

Cheese at Leadenhall City of London cheeseatleadenhall.co.uk

Culver + Nelson Richmond culverandnelson.com

Fortnum & Mason Piccadilly fortnumandmason.co.uk

Giacobazzi’s Delicatessen Hampstead giacobazzis.co.uk

Good Food Sydenham & Catford goodfood.org.uk

Hamish Johnston Clapham hamishjohnston.com

H G Walter Barons Court hgwalter.com

La Fromagerie Bloomsbury, Highbury & Marylebone lafromagerie.co.uk

Laura’s Larder Orpington lauraslarder.co.uk

MacFarlane’s Fromagerie & Fine Foods Clapham macfarlanesdeli.co.uk

Panzer’s Delicatessen St John’s Wood panzers.co.uk

Parson’s Nose Fulham parsonsnose.co.uk Partridges Chelsea partridges.co.uk

Paxton & Whitfield Piccadilly & Chelsea paxtonandwhitfield.co.uk

Scotch Meats Dulwich scotchmeats.co.uk

The De Beauvoir Deli Company Hackney thedebeauvoirdeli.co.uk

The Fine Cheese Co. Belgravia finecheese.co.uk

The Larder Deli Ladywell thelarderdeli.com

The Real Cheese Shop Barnes barnesvillage.com

MIDLANDS

DERBYSHIRE

Chatsworth Estate Farm Shop Bakewell chatsworth.org

Croots Farm Shop Duffield croots.co.uk

LEICESTERSHIRE

Dominic at David North Delicatessen Rothley dominicatdavidnorth.co.uk

Lane’s Deli and Fine Foods Lutterworth lanesdeliandfinefoods.co.uk

Mediterranean Deli & Farm Shop Wistow olivetreecompany.co.uk

The Melton Cheeseboard Melton Mowbray meltoncheeseboard.co.uk

LINCOLNSHIRE

The Cheese Society Lincoln thecheesesociety.co.uk

NOTTINGHAMSHIRE

Delilah Fine Foods Nottingham delilahfinefoods.co.uk

Spring Land Farm Shop Nottingham springlanefarmshop.co.uk

SHROPSHIRE

Apley Farm Shop Shifnal apleyfarmshop.co.uk

Broad Bean Ludlow broad-bean.com

Ludlow Farmshop Ludlow ludlowfarmshop.co.uk

The Fields Kitchen Market Drayton facebook.com/thefieldskitchen

STAFFORDSHIRE

Perrys of Eccleshall Stafford perrysofeccleshall.co.uk

The Cheese Station Burton-on-Trent thecheesestation.co.uk

WARWICKSHIRE

Aubrey Allen Leamington Spa aubreyallenleamington.co.uk

Cheese on the Green Rugby cheeseonthegreen.com

Maypole Butchers Wellesbourne maypolebutchers.co.uk

Oakes Farm Shop Coventrys oakesfarmshop.co.uk

Stratford Garden Centre Stratford Upon Avon stratfordgardencentre.co.uk

Willow Cottage at Applegates Chester willowcottagefarmshop.com

COUNTY DURHAM

Samuel James Deli Cafe Barnard Castle samueljamesdelicafe.co.uk

CUMBRIA

Cranstons Quality Butchers Brampton, Carlisle, Orton Grange & Penrith cranstons.net

Low Sizergh Barn Farm Shop Kendal lowsizerghbarn.co.uk

Pioneer Foodstore Carlisle Harrington pioneerfoodstore.co.uk

The Cheese Delicatessen Keswick Keswick keswickcheesedeli.co.uk

The Chopping Block Penrith thechoppingblockpenrith.com

EAST RIDING OF YORKSHIRE

MERSEYSIDE

Gillions of Crosby Crosby gillionsofcrosby.co.uk

The Deli at 40A Newton-le-Willows facebook.com/thedeliat40a

NORTH YORKSHIRE

Aldred’s Fine Cheese Scarborough aldredsfinecheese.co.uk

Beadlam Grange Farm Shop York beadlamgrange.co.uk

Crimple Harrogate crimple.co.uk Dogh York dogh.co.uk

Five Houses by Kitson & Sons Yarm fivehouses.co.uk

Field and Fawcett York fieldandfawcett.co.uk Fodder Harrogate fodder.co.uk

Town End Farm Shop Skipton townendfarmshop.co.uk

NORTHUMBERLAND

The Cheese Room at Alnwick Deli Alnwick facebook.com/ thecheeseroomatthealnwickdeli

Tully’s of Rothbury Rothbury rothburydeli.co.uk

SOUTH YORKSHIRE

The Silverhill Larder Sheffield silverhilllarder.co.uk

TYNE & WEAR

The Blagdon Farm Shop Newcastle-upon-Tyne theblagdonfarmshop.co.uk

The Deli Around the Corner North Shields thedeliaroundthecorner.co.uk

WEST YORKSHIRE

Blacker Hall Farm Shop Wakefield blackerhallfarmshop.co.uk

The Farm Stratford-upon-Avon thefarmstratford.com

WORCESTERSHIRE

Load Street Deli Bewdley loadstreetdeli.com

THE NORTH

CHESHIRE

Godfrey C. Williams & Son Sandbach godfreycwilliams.co.uk

The Cheese Yard Knutsford cheeseyard.co.uk

The Lambing Shed Farm Shop & Café Knutsford thelambingshed.com

Apron Strings Culinary Studio Hedon apronstrings.uk

Drewton’s Near Brough drewtons.co.uk

The Pickled Fig Hessle thepickledfig.co.uk

GREATER MANCHESTER

Albion Farm Shop Oldham albionfarmshop.co.uk

Chorlton Cheesemongers Chorlton chorltoncheesemongers.co.uk

The Cheese Hamlet Didsbury cheesehamlet.co.uk

Hunters of Helmsley Helmsley huntersofhelmsley.com Lewis & Cooper Northallerton lewisandcooper.co.uk

Love Cheese York lovecheese.co.uk

The Cheeseboard - Harrogate Harrogate thecheeseboard.net

The Courtyard Dairy Settle thecourtyarddairy.co.uk

The Deli at no 85 Skelton-in-Cleveland

The Whitby Deli Whitby thewhitbydeli.co.uk

Cryer & Stott Cheesemongers Castleford & Pontefract cryerandstott.co.uk

Craggies Farm Shop Hebden Bridge craggiesfarmshop.uk

Farmer Copleys Pontefract farmercopleys.co.uk

George & Joseph Cheesemongers Leeds georgeandjoseph.co.uk

Hinchliffe’s Farm Shop Netherton, Huddersfield hinchliffes.com

Origin Fine Foods Bradford originfinefoods.co.uk

The Artisan Cheese Company Wetherby artisancheese.co

The Kaltbach Cave

EXPERTISE: Aged in a 22-million year old sandstone cave in Switzerland where cavemasters have been refining cheese for more than 60 years.

NATURAL CLIMATE: The cave climate is stable throughout the year, therefore artificial climate control is not necessary.

TRUSTED BRAND: The Kaltbach brand gives consumers a trusted and recognisable family of cheeses to explore. For more information on our Kaltbach range of cheese go to www.emmi-kaltbach.com/international or email

SOUTH EAST

BERKSHIRE

Cheese Etc – The Pangbourne Cheese Shop Pangbourne, Reading cheese-etc.co.uk

Cobbs Farm Shop & Kitchen Hungerford, Englefield  & Basingstoke cobbsfarmshops.co.uk

Tastes Delicatessen Windsor tastesdeli.co.uk

The Grumpy Goat Reading thegrumpygoat.co.uk

BUCKINGHAMSHIRE

Hambleden Village Stores Hambleden, Henley-on-Thames facebook.com/ hambledenvillagestores/

No. 2 Pound Street Wendover 2poundstreet.com

The Farm Deli Milton Keynes thefarmdeli.com

EAST SUSSEX

Cheese & Delicatessen Bexhill-on-Sea

Cheese Please Lewes cheesepleaselewes.co.uk

Eggs To Apples Farm Shop Etchingham eggstoapples.co.uk

Middle Farm Shop Lewes middlefarm.com

Shearer’s Fine Foods Forest Row shearersfinefoods.co.uk

HAMPSHIRE

Cobbs Farm Shop & Kitchen Winchester  cobbsfarmshops.co.uk

Cork & Cheese Southampton thecorkandcheese.co.uk

Hockey’s Farm Shop Fordingbridge hockeys-farm.co.uk

Mange2 Deli Alresford mange2.co.uk

The Sett Brockenhurst thesettbrockenhurst.co.uk

Thyme & Tides Stockbridge thymeandtidesdeli.co.uk

Wellington Farm Shop Hook wellingtonfarmshop.co.uk

HERTFORDSHIRE

Bury Lane Farm Shop Royston burylanefarmshop.co.uk

French & Day Delicatessen Ware frenchandday.co.uk

Halsey’s Deli Hitchin halseysdeli.co.uk

The Fleetville Larder St Albans fleetvillelarder.com

KENT Falconhurst Edenbridge falconhurst.co.uk

Farmview Rochester facebook.com/ farmviewbutchers/

Fuller’s Farm Shop Tunbridge Wells fullers-tw.co.uk

Holwood Farm Shop Keston holwoodfarm.co.uk

Macknade Fine Foods Ashford & Faversham macknade.com

The Cheese Shop, Tunbridge Wells Tunbridge Wells thecheeseshoptw.co.uk

OXFORDSHIRE

Added Ingredients Abingdon addedingredients.co.uk

Blue Tin Produce Wallingford bluetinproduce.co.uk

Pickle & Lime Oxford pickleandlime.co.uk

The Granary Delicatessen Watlington granarydeli.co.uk

SURREY HolmeStores Dorking holmestores.com

Priory Farm Estate Redhill prioryfarm.co.uk

Secretts Farm Shop Milford, Godalming secretts.co.uk

WEST SUSSEX Beach Deli Shoreham-by-Sea beachdeli.co.uk

Cowdray Farm Shop Midhurst cowdrayfarmshop.co.uk

Pallant of Arundel Arundel pallantofarundel.co.uk

Rushfields Farm Shop Brighton rushfields.com

The Hungry Guest Chichester & Petworth thehungryguest.com

SOUTH WEST

CORNWALL Bellinis Deli Kitchen Bude

bellinisdelikitchen.co.uk

Hugh Street Cafe Isles of Scilly hughstreetcafe.co.uk

Relish Food & Drink Wadebridge relishcornwall.co.uk

Tanglewood Kitchen St Mary’s, Isles of Scilly tanglewoodkitchen.co.uk

DEVON

Johns of Instow and Appledore Instow johnsofinstow.co.uk

Quickes Traditional Near Exeter quickes.co.uk

The Ashburton Delicatessen Ashburton ashburtondelicatessen.co.uk

The Cheeseboard – Sidmouth Sidmouth cheeseboardsidmouth.com

Wildmoor Fine Food & Drink Bovey Tracey wildmoor-deli.co.uk

DORSET

Brace of Butchers Dorchester braceofbutchers.co.uk

Quaff and Tipple Bournemouth quaffandtipple.com

The Pear Tree Delicatessen Sherborne peartreedeli.co.uk

Trencherman’s of Dorset Sherborne trenchermans.com

GLOUCESTERSHIRE

Armadeli Stroud armadeli.com

Daylesford Organic Nr. Kingham daylesford.com

Food Fanatics

Cheltenham food-fanatics.co.uk

Forest Deli Coleford forest-deli.co.uk

Melanie’s Kitchen Downend, nr Bristol facebook.com/ melskitchendownend/

Teddington Stores Teddington teddingtonstores.co.uk

The Cheeseworks Cheltenham thecheeseworks.co.uk

The Cotswold Cheese Co. Moreton-in-Marsh & Stow-on-the-Wold cotswoldcheesecompany.co.uk

SOMERSET

Docky’s Delicatessen Radstock dockys.co.uk

Paxton & Whitfield Bath paxtonandwhitfield.co.uk

Queen Street Delicatessen Wells queenstreetdeli.co.uk

Roth Bar and Grill & Durslade Farmhouse Bruton rothbarandgrill.co.uk

The Bristol Cheesemonger Bristol bristol-cheese.co.uk

The Fine Cheese Co. Bath finecheese.co.uk

Thorner’s of Somerset Shepton Mallet jonthorners.co.uk

Ziggy’s Deli Bristol ziggysdeli.com

WILTSHIRE

Aldbourne Stores Marlborough  facebook.com/AldbourneStores

Allington Farm Shop Chippenham allingtonfarmshop.co.uk

Bloomfields Fine Food Highworth, Swindon & Shrivenham, Swindon bloomfieldsfinefood.co.uk

Compton McRae Semley comptonmcrae.com

Mauls Wine & Cheese Bar Salisbury maulswinebar.com

Stourhead Farm Shop Warminster stourhead.com

Walter Rose & Son Devizes walterroseandson.co.uk

SCOTLAND

ABERDEENSHIRE

Food for Thought Turriff foodforthoughtdeli.co.uk

DUMFRIES & GALLOWAY

The Dumfries Larder Dumfries facebook.com/ thedumfrieslarder/

EAST AYRSHIRE Geraldo’s Largs geraldos.co.uk

EAST LOTHIAN

Farm Shop & Cafe At The Mart East Linton martfarmshop.co.uk

The Cheese Lady Haddington thecheeselady.co.uk

EDINBURGH

Craigie’s Farm South Queensferry craigies.co.uk

Hopetoun Farm Shop Newton hopetoun.co.uk/farm-shop FIFE Elie Deli Leven eliedeli.co.uk

HIGHLANDS

Connage Highland Dairy Inverness connage.co.uk

Corner on the Square Beauly corneronthesquare.co.uk

PERTH & KINROSS

Hansen’s Kitchen Crieff hansenskitchen.com

McNee’s Delicatessen Crieff mcneesofcrieff.co.uk

Provender Brown Perth provenderbrown.co.uk

The House of Bruar Pitlochry houseofbruar.com/food-hall

SCOTTISH BORDERS

The Country Kitchen Deli Roxburghshire countrykitchendeli.co.uk

The Mainstreet Trading Company Melrose mainstreetbooks.co.uk

STIRLING

Deli Ecosse Callander deliecosse.co.uk

WESTERN ISLES

The Good Food Boutique Stornoway thegoodfoodboutique.co.uk

NORTHERN IRELAND

ANTRIM

Arcadia Delicatessen Belfast arcadiadeli.co.uk

DOWN Ispini Charcuterie Moira ispinicharcuterie.com

McCartney’s of Moira Craigavon mccartneysofmoira.com

TYRONE Glebe Farm and Co Dungannon glebefarmandco.com

WALES

DENBIGHSHIRE

Porter’s Delicatessen Llangollen portersdeli.co.uk

Rhug Organic Farm Corwen rhug.co.uk

The Deli on the Hill Prestatyn thedelionthehill.co.uk

FLINTSHIRE

Hawarden Estate Farm Shop Deeside hawardenestate.co.uk

GLAMORGAN

Wally’s Delicatessen Cardiff wallysdeli.co.uk

GWYNEDD

Blas Ar Fwyd Cyf Llanrwst blasarfwyd.com

PEMBROKESHIRE

The Gourmet Pig Fishguard gourmetpig.co.uk

LEARN | TASTE | UNDERSTAND | COMMUNICATE

RETAIL CHEESE TRAINING

Our one-day course for anyone sourcing or selling cheese, delivered by industry and retail experts. Understand how cheese is made, how it should be stored and sold, gain skills to help communicate with customers and sell more cheese from a position of knowledge.

2022 courses, visit

Clemency Hall

Expe rt ly Hand Craf ted Cheese

Clemency Hall offers a selection of the best of British and European cheeses, exclusive to Rowcliffe, for Independent Retailers.

Contact your Rowcliffe area sales manager or telesales executive to place your Clemency Hall order, on 01892 838999 or email sales@rowcliffe.co.uk. www.rowcliffe.co.uk