Cheese has been around a long time. Nobody is quite sure how long but perhaps 5000 to 12,000 years, probably originating from the Middle East where milk products were curdled and drained of whey and preserved with salt making something a bit like the fetta we know today.
In Australia, cheese has been around since the first fleet. It is a mere 160 years since the first cheesemaking equipment arrived from England and the first dairy co-operatives formed in the Western District and Gippsland in Victoria and in the Darling Downs in Queensland, according to the Australian Specialty Cheesemakers Association (ASCA).
The focus then was on British-style cheeses, such as cheddar, but with the influx of post Second World War European migrants new varieties started to be made based on regional and family traditions. This time was a low point for European cheese; the continent on the verge of famine and agriculture recovering from a long war. This nearly destroyed British cheesemaking but a resurgence of interest in artisanal products means there are now some 700 distinct local cheeses in the country, while France and Italy have about 800 combined.
In Australia there are no ancient traditions defining what regions cheeses come from or are best made with the breed, climate, time of year and rainfall influencing the richness of the milk produced.
In short, cheese from Europe has an edge over Australian ones thanks to hundreds of years of trial and error in making them. Each one – whether blue, runny, stinky or a combination of all three – has hundreds of years of agrarian history behind it.
Australia is a post-industrial nation, where for many years cheese was produced on an industrial scale to suit the bland palate or they were simply creamy imitations of European classics such as brie, which in the 1970s was imported in tins.
Even the ASCA, originally established to promote raw milk cheese and small scale artisan production, has lost its way. Its management doesn’t support the production of raw milk products, which many artisans say gives cheese better flavour. And its president, David Brown, denies that terroir has any place in developing a cheese’s flavour or texture.
In winemaking, terroir is a well-known concept in which the mineral content in the soil, local yeasts and climate specific to even a small patch of land will affect its quality and price. This is why a Burgundy wine such as Domane de la Romaneé-Conti, from a small 1.8ha patch of vineyard, produces some 450 cases a year, each bottle selling for several thousands of dollars.
But a growing band of Australia’s artisan cheese producers, such as the Bruny Island Cheese Company’s Nick Haddow, are starting to believe terroir is an important factor in the flavour of the cheese. This means that the actual paddock from where the milk comes from matters. As does the earth beneath the grass, its mineral content and the climate in the area.
This instantly disadvantages many cow’s milk cheeses in Australia from ever having the potential to have great unique flavour and character. Cow’s milk is produced by large dairy cooperatives where all milk is poured into one giant vat, meaning that any essence of locality of lost in the product.
Australia’s sheep’s and goat’s cheesemakers fare better. For instance, Main Ridge Dairy on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula, where the philosophy is paddock to plate, has 170 goats on the 52ha property.
Cheese educator Ryan Andrijich says: “There is definitely a terroir with cheese. That’s why brie and camembert, which taste so different even though they are made in a similar way. You have the pasture which is affected by the minerals in the land, the climate, the temperature of the milk … even the maturation areas have their own terroir.”
In France for instance, the caves where the raw milk roquefort is matured have their own microclimate determined by water leaching through, airflow, temperature, and local bacteria and yeasts.
With many styles of European cheeses taking several years to mature, it is harder for Australian cheesemakers to mimic them as it can take decades to perfect. But young curd cheeses are easier, taking only days or weeks to peak and tend to be better products in Australia.
Andrijich says that for Holy Goat’s signature cheese La Luna benefits from growths of the Geotrichum bacteria which leads to the signature wavy white mould skin.
It also has an edge because it is made from goat’s milk, and goats (as well as sheep) are better suited to arid Australia than cows and buffalo. “I think our goat and sheep cheeses here compete on a global scale as our climate is so much similar to these places in Europe that make goat’s and sheep’s cheese such as Greece, Cyprus and Spain.
“We haven’t got anything that resembles anything like an Alpine climate, except perhaps Tasmania.”
And coincidentally, it is northern Tasmania where one of Australia’s best hard cheeses originates, Heidi gruyere, a dairy now owned by National Foods.
“In making aged cheese like Gruyere it can take years to perfect the recipe,” says Andrijich. And that is something that the Heidi dairy did.
Cheese Types
Unripened Or Fresh Cheeses
These are mild and tangy uncooked cheeses such as fromage frais. They have a relatively high moisture content and perish quickly. These cheeses include fetta, made from goat’s or sheep’s milk; mascarpone, a soft creamy cow’s milk cheese; ricotta, made from leftover cow’s milk whey; and mozzarella, usually made from buffalo milk.
Soft Cheeses
These include mould ripened, washed rind and blue cheeses. With soft skins and creamy centres, these cheeses are often only at their peak for a few days but last longer than fresh cheeses. They include: brie, a French cheese made from cow’s milk; camembert, made to a similar formula as brie; gorgonzola, a blue-veined cow’s milk cheese from Italy; roquefort a raw milk blue-veined sheep’s cheese; and stilton, a blue-veined English cow’s milk cheese.
Firm Cheeses
These are dense cheeses with a relatively low moisture content of 30 to 40 per cent. They include favourites such as cheddar, made from cow’s milk; the Swiss cheese with holes emmenthal; and provolone, a cow’s milk cheese from southern Italy.
Hard Cheeses
With typically 30 per cent moisture and aged, these cheeses are deep in flavour. They include the sharp and pungent parmiagiano-reggiano from Italy; pecorino made from sheep’s milk; and the alpine cow’s milk cheese gruyére.
How To Store And Serve Cheese
Most cheese are best kept at a temperature of 8 to 14C at a humidity of about 80 per cent, which generally means a warmer shelf in the fridge They are worst kept wrapped in plastic film.
Ideally waxed paper, cotton or muslin should be used to wrap cheese to allow it to breath and stored in a container that can breathe. Some shops sell cheese bags but a plastic or polystyrene or insulated box, punctured on top with several holes so it can breath, with a damp cloth in it will work.
An insulated box is ideal as it can isolate cheese from rapid increases in temperature, which damage it.
Cheese is best served at room temperature. Allowing an insulated box to reach room temperature is the best way to protect it.