Blessed are the cheesemakers

A CREAMERY has been recognised in a nationwide cheese competition.

Three cheeses made at the Nettlebed Creamery received awards at the annual British and Irish Cheese Awards.

It won gold for Highmoor, gold for Witheridge In Hay and bronze for its Bix cheeses.

Heather Taylor, head cheesemaker, was “over the moon” with the results.

She said: “The team put so much work into the cheese every day. It’s a real labour of love.

“Everything we do is by hand and we have put a lot of passion and a lot of effort into making the cheeses as good as we can.

“To  have that recognised with an award it makes it all worthwhile.”

The awards, established in 1994, has a range of categories, culminating in a “Supreme Champion. Highmoor won gold in the soft or semi-soft rind washed class.

Miss Taylor explained that it was similar to a Taleggio and each cheese was washed by hand.

She said: “It’s quite soft and it’s generally quite a funky, brothy flavoured cheese. It’s really good for your cheese board but it’s also great for cooking with. It’s quite a versatile cheese.

“It’s washed by hand by our team two or three times a week until it’s fully aged at three weeks and ready to be sold.”

Witheridge in Hay won gold in the retailer awards where it was entered in the ‘Other Hard Cheese’ class by Waitrose and Partners. Miss Taylor said: “It’s a semi-hard Alpine style cheese and it is usually aged anywhere between six and nine months.

“It spends its time in organic hay from the farm and that gives it a real floral, fragrant herby aroma that’s reminiscent of the British countryside on a summer’s day.”

Witheridge has a natural rind which is left alone to form as the cheese ages while the washing of the Highmoor was to encourage more bacteria to form.

She said: “When you leave a cheese to age, moulds and things will form on the cheese and that's what forms the rind, and it’s perfectly fine to eat.

“The Highmoor is also a natural rind, but it's a rind that we as makers encourage. A batch could be anywhere between 600 and 700 cheeses. So, on any given washing day, we could be washing 600 to 1,400 cheeses by hand.”

“This sort of artisanal nature of the cheese can’t be understated. It’s a lot of time, care and attention that you sort of don’t get from a mass-produced cheese.”

Bix took bronze in the category for cow’s milk cheeses that weigh 500 grams or less.

It is a triple-cream, soft, white-rinded cheese loosely based on Chaource from in the Champagne region of France.

Miss Taylor described the cheese as “incredibly indulgent”. She said: “We separate our own cream from our milk and we add double cream to the make. It’s a very creamy, luxurious cheese which is really good with British sparkling wine.” Miss Taylor, who has worked at the creamery for five years, first got into cheesemaking after a job milking goats for another producer.

After being made redundant during the covid pandemic, she saw an advert for an assistant cheesemaker at the creamery and became head cheesemaker 18 months later. “I fell in love with it,” she said. “I really got into it and became really passionate about it.”

Monique Gooranah, the manager of the Cheese Shed at the creamery, said Highmoor and Witheridge are the main ingredients in the cafe’s cheese toasties. She said: “We use the Highmoor because it’s a nice runny one and the Witheridge has a stronger flavour. Kids tend to like Witheridge more because it’s more like a cheddar.

Nettlebed Creamery was launched in 2015 and is owned by Rose Grimond whose great-grandfather bought the farm in 1901.