Artisan cheese makers across the UK are in crisis due to the collapse of the restaurant industry. It has affected us, to an extent, but it’s affecting many of our friends in the industry a great deal.
One small thing we thought we could do is raise awareness of some of these beautiful cheeses - that are so often found on the menus of high end restaurants - to our customers. We know these cheeses won’t be suitable for many of our customers, and we understand this.
For anyone who is mainly interested in our cheese because of our cow with calf farming system, or for people following vegetarian diets, these bundles probably aren’t for you. But for our customers who buy from us for reasons of sustainability, tradition and cheese quality – we thought you might enjoy an opportunity to try these iconic Scottish cheeses.
Each bundle includes cheeses made from cow, goat and ewe’s milk, and all are unpasteurised, with the exception of our own Bluebell. The guest cheeses come from two cheesemakers – Errington Cheese in Lanarkshire and Isle of Mull Cheese.
Why these two? Well, in addition to both these cheesemakers being enormously helpful to us when we were starting out, and an ongoing source of support and advice, both have interesting approaches to animal husbandry.
In fact the Erringtons recently trialled leaving the lambs of their milking flock with their mothers for an extended period, similar to our cow with calf approach. They discovered this resulted in a whole host of complicated challenges relating to animal health, so they stopped the trial.
It’s another example of just how challenging it is to change an established livestock farming system. From an animal welfare point of view, we have no hesitation in recommending both these cheesemakers, and we think their cheeses are exceptional too.