Udder Delights Goats Cheesery - Lobethal

"Come on Nelly, good girls." It all started four years ago when the Dunford family purchased their first goat Nell and another playmate. But goats being goats, a pair soon grew into a herd and from small beginnings a dream was born. They're very affectionate animals and smart and over the years they've provided a few headaches for Andrew. "All the gates we have different locks on because they work out how to open a lock." "Really" "So we've got to keep changing the locks." But each morning there is plenty of milk and ultimately it finds its way here to the old Onkaparinga Woollen Company Mills in the main street of Lobethal. They've now been converted into a commercial centre dedicated to incubating small businesses and in here the incubation process is well and truly underway. "This is called cutting the curd and this enables the whey to come out a little bit easier and as you can see all this lime green yellowy liquid." "Is that the whey?" "That's the whey, you know Miss Muffet on her Tuffet, I never knew what curd and whey was until I started doing this." In order to get to this stage, Sheree has already added rennet, it's a little like junket and caused the milk to set. "I want it to basically overflow so that they get really full and we do one tray at a time and do all those to the end." "Ok and does that then compact down into one camembert." "About that size so that's how much milks in there." And the difference between each is determined by the bacterial culture added, the types of moulds used and the time taken to drain and mature. And with Camembert there's a ten minute window to get the curd and whey into the brine soaked moulds, so Sheree cracks the whip.

The Goat cheesery is known as Udder Delights but Sheree freely admits it can be udder madness come camembert time. "Whoops. I'll fix that. That's not bad, that's not bad at all.". Oh dominoes, so that's a tray that's been lost, that's good Sarah hadn't done that before." But there's still plenty left to keep Sheree busy. "There you go. so that's the turn done. And we take it off." "So what's that do?" "It makes your top side nice and even like these ones are and it also makes the weight to drain evenly." And by lunchtime a new batch of camembert's is ready for storage. And then comes the taste test. Goats cheese is more easily digested than cheese made from cows' milk and is lower in cholesterol. Sheree's most popular cheese is the brancoleite fresh. "This one you can actually spread because it's a very very soft cheese or you can serve it as we are on a platter. Cooking, great for cooking, serving with fruits, all savoury products. I think that's why it's so popular because it goes with everything. When matured the brancoleite hardens and the taste is more like a parmesan. Other products include the Fromage Blanc and there's even a goat's milk, chocolate chip and caramel ice-cream. Udder Delights products are available at Stall 55 at the Central market and a host of other Gourmet shops. You can also taste the products at the Cheesery at the Onkaparinga Enterprise Centre, Building 15/1, The Adelaide Lobethal Road. You can contact them on 0412 650 594.

For more information you can email info@postcards-sa.com.au