How is the cheesemaker's day?

We will see below the typical day of an artisan cheesemaker, that is, those who prepare fresh cheese by personally checking (and often doing with their own hands) all stages of production.

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Usually the cheesemaker wakes up very early, around four in the morning. Why? Because fresh cheese need a few hours to be prepared and must be ready, by tradition, before lunch. The first important thing that the dairyman does, after changing clothes and sterilizing his hands, is to receive milk from the farm. They start from milk and end with making fresh cheese from fresh milk.

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The milk is usually delivered with a refrigerated tank truck. Very important is the control of bacteria in milk. Milk, a living element, contains both good and bad bacteria. The cheesemaker checks that the harmful bacteria are not greater than an established quantity. A milk with few harmful bacteria is considered good. In Vietnam there are four levels of milk.  The fresh cow milk make its fresh cheese. Cow's milk has moderate levels of special fatty acids, but lots of milk proteins. At Ottima Cheese, we use only and exclusively level 1 milk, the best on the market, because it is both more flavorful and superior in quality.

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The cheesemaker proceeds to coagulate the milk in curd, a seemingly simple process that requires a lot of experience and attention. The milk becomes curd and is spun or processed by the cheesemaker in order to obtain the various cheese according to the different "regulations". The spinning process is very characteristic and interesting to observe. The obtained fresh cheese must be cooled and kept cool, in the cold room or in the fridge-display of the shop that is usually attached to the dairy. Obviously good fresh cheese is the key to a great cheese plate.

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We can see some dairies with shops all over Italy, especially in the south of this country that gave rise to dairy products. The ends the first part of his working day before noon, when customers enter the shop to buy cheesemaker the freshly made products. In the afternoon the cheesemaker takes care of checking the medium and long maturing cheeses, turning the shapes into "aging hollow", checking that the forms are aging correctly and without unwanted mold.

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The best way to learn so much about fresh cheese and understand them better is to see how they are made. The aromas, the colors of milk that change during processing and aging, the continuous tasting to verify that the flavors are the right ones makes us grow the passion for the world of cheese in general.

Ottima Cheese Team