Passion, provenance and a sprinkle of Wensleydale magic: How we create our award winning cheese

Industry accolades don’t come more coveted than at the International Cheese and Dairy Awards, and we were delighted to not only be awarded Gold for our Yorkshire Wensleydale this summer, but also take home the prestigious Berkel Trophy for Best Creamy Territorial Cheese.

A fantastic achievement given the volume of entries from across the world and the stiff competition from fellow territorial cheeses around the UK such as Cheshire, Lancashire, Red Leicester, and Double Gloucester.

Unique in its provenance and heritage, Yorkshire Wensleydale was granted Protected Geographical Indication status (PGI), from the European Commission in 2013, which ensures that only Yorkshire Wensleydale is produced in the designated area in accordance with its time-honoured traditional recipe.

This makes Yorkshire Wensleydale unique in itself, but what makes it special amongst other cheeses is the care and attention given to its creation, along with a sprinkle of Wensleydale magic!

It all begins with the starter culture.  With many cheese producers in the UK buying in this crucial element, which is essentially the ingredient that turns milk into cheese, Wensleydale Creamery are amongst only a handful of producers whose skilled team create a bespoke and unique culture inhouse.

This technically skilled, three-day process is a crucial factor in creating Yorkshire Wensleydale’s distinctive taste and texture. The fine balance of good bacteria, coupled with the specific environmental factors created by our team, is what makes our cheese special and synonymous with the quality consumers have come to expect.

Time, temperatures, and processes are all carefully monitored throughout by our lab team, whose attention to detail at this stage turns the 30+ different strains of good bacteria into our secret ingredient for success.

The milk we use to create our cheese is also uniquely special.  Sourced direct from local farms, many of whose herds graze on limestone pastureland unique to the area, the milk is first pasteurised and goes through a process of ‘standardisation’ depending on the time of year, to balance the levels of fat and proteins.  The result is milk that works perfectly when combined with our starter culture, again a process that is bespoke to our cheesemaking here at Wensleydale and results in the best quality and flavour.

Once combined, the cheesemaking can begin. With a good, healthy starter culture added to the milk, our cheesemakers monitor the levels of acidity to determine how long the mix should be agitated for. Our team know the exact levels and environmental factors at this stage to create the ‘ideal make’ which produces a perfect Yorkshire Wensleydale each time.

Fat, salt and moisture are all key components, with a ‘bullseye’ of ideal levels achieved, to result in perfectly balanced salt levels and in turn the distinctive flavour of the overall cheese.

Did you know that the creamery in which a cheese is produced also has an impact on its specific flavour outcome?  Seasoned Cheese Graders can tell the difference between cheeses made in different dairies, known in cheesemaking as the ‘mark of the creamery’, in the same way that we might be able to determine who made a particular dish.  Wensleydale Creamery is no different, with it’s own factors determining the overall flavour, texture and quality of our cheese.

The final process is grading, a highly skilled element which sees our team of experienced Graders grade and monitor each batch of Yorkshire Wensleydale.

Using a cheese iron, a specialist tool similar to an apple corer, to take a sample, at this final stage the cheese should have a sweet aroma and fresh, creamy taste, along with a firm body and our signature crumbly texture, which supports itself and crumbles between a thumb and forefinger.

Producing award-winning Yorkshire Wensleydale Cheese is a team effort and we’re proud to have such passionate and skilled people working on its creation at each stage, to preserve the heritage, provenance and quality of our much-loved cheese.

Team members who made our award-winning Yorkshire Wensleydale: Johnny Guy (Production Supervisor), Martin Pounder and Asta Vicianova (Production Supervisors) Rob Parry (Lab – Starter cultures) Kamil Vician (Milk Intake and starter production) Robert Back (Cheesemaker) Snow Smirnova (Packing)