Cheese making has a long tradition in Wales. Early cheeses resembled the famous Caerphilly and were immersed in brine. The very same cheese was used as part of the divorce settlement under the laws of Hywel Dda. It seems that the cheese in brine went to the wife and the cheese which was hung up, went to the husband.

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries goat and sheep milk was being replaced by cows' milk. Records exist which show that in the twentieth century some sheep were still being milked. This milk was mixed with cows' milk that had been skimmed to make butter and thus the eating quality of the cheese was improved.

Fresh Soft Cheese
Pantysgawn goats cheese (Abergavenny), Rhosygilwen cows soft cheese. These types of cheese have a high moisture content and a limited shelf life.

Some are made by souring the milk, then straining the curd or passing it through a separator to remove much of the moisture, giving a white, crumbly, but soft spreadable product. The flavour is mildly acid. This type of cheese lends itself to rolling in or mixing with herbs, spices, fruits etc. and being sold tubs, small rounds or logs. Another form of soft cheese is made by cutting the curd, and placing it in a shaped mould to allow for natural drainage. This gives the cheese a soft silky texture.

Salt is sprinkled or rubbed onto the surface. The flavour is mild and delicate when a few days old. This cheese can be matured under the right conditions when a distinctive mouldy rind develops. None of these cheese are pressed. They are light in texture and lower in fat than many of the hard cheese. Soft cheese can be eaten spread on a biscuit or with a salad, it are also much used in cooking.

Soft Mould Ripened Cheese and Blue cheese

Caws Preseli (Pantmawr), Perl Wen (Caws Cenarth)
Mould ripened cheese are still regarded by some with some suspicion. Moulds can grow when and where they are not welcome, and in such cases it may be correct to discard such cheese. However, there are desirable moulds, both white and blue, which not only assist in the process of maturing the cheese but also provide another wonderful array of textures and flavours.   Mould ripened cheese.

Blue Cheese
Blue cheese is a mould ripened type, with blue green veins throughout the cheese. Many are only made when the milk is most suited to this type of cheese and thus are not available throughout the year. Granston is typical of cheese made only when the milk is deemed to be at its best. Some such as Landsker are pressed whereas others are a softer creamier type of cheese. Gorau Glas has the distinction of winning a gold award at the 2002 British Awards.

Hard and Semi Hard Cheese

Most of the cheese produced and consumed in Wales and the UK can be placed in this category. Cheddar is the most popular and the most copied of the hard cheese. Caerphilly is a softer cheese, sometimes classed as a semi hard cheese because it is only lightly pressed when compared with Cheddar. Hard cheese of the Cheddar type can be defined as a firm cheese with a close texture.

A Cheshire type can be a little more open, almost granular in texture, whereas a traditional Caerphilly has a close but flaky texture. Traditional cheese, pressed in the old style presses, usually have a degree of openness. This adds to the character of the cheese. Modern commercial blockformers draw vacuum rather than press the curd into shape. This gives a dense cheese, a product preferred for cutting and packing into portions and slices.

Washed Rind Cheese
This can be a semi soft or a hard type of cheese. The distinguishing feature is the colour of the rind, caused by washing or wiping the surface of the cheese with a cloth soaked in brine and containing a bacterium called Brevibacterium linens, often with other selected micro-organisms. The liquid may also contain herbs or wine and is usually a recipe secret to the maker.

Some cheese have a dry orange brown rind, whereas others have a distinctive sticky rind with a rather pungent aroma. The texture of most of these types of cheese is soft and pliable, even creamy. The flavour is mildly aromatic. Many find the aroma overpowering, even objectionable. Because of this, they are very much the choice of the connoisseur, but once tried these cheeses are superb.

Gouda Type Cheese and Smoked cheese
Small variations in the cheesemaking recipe produce a vast variety of cheese. In the Gouda type of cheese, some of the whey is removed and replaced with water, thus it is known as a washed curd cheese. Once the curd is compacted under this watery whey mixture, it is cut and moulded. There is no texturing as for the Cheddar type of cheese.

Smoked Cheese

The smoking of foods was a means of preservation and it still retains that preservative function in some cases. It has also been a tradition to smoke certain varieties of cheese. Today smoked cheese supplies another variant of a particular type of cheese.

Speciality Cheese - Cheese with Additives
There is a vast range of these as can be seen under each individual cheesemaker. Herbs such as sage can be added to the curd during the cheesemaking process. It was customary to add a green colour (chlorophyll) such as strained chopped cabbage or spinach. That colour if added, is now obtained commercially.

Most additives, both sweet and savoury, are mixed with the cheese after it has been made. The cheese is broken up or milled into pieces, the additive mixed in and the whole reformed into a recognisable shape. Additives are mixed into soft cheese or the cheese can be rolled in the additive giving the whole product an attractive presentation.

Mozzarella - Pasta Filata or Stretched Curd Cheese
Traditional Mozzarella is a fresh, stretched curd (pasta filata) cheese made from the milk of water buffalo. The curds are kneaded in hot water to give the stretched texture which looks like rolled chicken breast.

It is formed into hand size balls and is sold in a mixture of brine and whey. As a freshly made cheese it is delicious with a delicate milky flavour. It can be eaten like an apple, or sliced with tomato, basil and a little olive oil. Its claim to fame however is the elastic nature of the cheese when melted, an essential ingredient for a pizza.

Grated and Sliced Cheese - Ash Manor products
The development of take away, ready meals and other convenience foods has resulted in a demand for cheese as an ingredient. This is not a new concept, although in many cases the making of cheese sauces or even Welsh rarebit was considered only as a useful means to use up the 'leftovers'.

Source:http://www.wda.co.uk
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