Terri Dunbar-Curran
“CHEESE makes people smile, even the sound of the word,” says Luke Williams, co-owner of Culture Club Cheese on Bree Street. The bright yellow fromagerie and restaurant is attracting a growing family of cheese-enthusiasts.
When I pop in one morning, Luke is chatting to one of his suppliers (Barry Sergeant of Beatrix Dairy in Ficksburg, who has made the long journey with something special) and an enthusiastic family spellbound by the fridge display. Luke is only too happy to talk people through his cheeses and let them taste whatever catches their fancy.
Culture Club stocks mostly local products, with only 20 percent of the cheeses imported.
“Importing is expensive and it marginalises who can buy it,” explains Luke, adding that the extensive range of dairy delights is seasonal. “There’s going to be a lot more goat cheese coming in at the end of August.”
Barry’s special delivery is his first attempt at sheep-milk cheese and he has brought it especially for Luke to try.
“Barry’s cheese is as free range as you can possibly get. His farm is idyllic,” says Luke, as he adds a small piece of the cheese to my platter. I’m honoured to be invited to share something so precious.
Beatrix Dairy also makes goat cheese. “Right now it’s kidding season,” says Luke, explaining that kids are taken away from their mothers after only a few days. “But Barry keeps the kids with the mothers for as long as possible. He believes the quality of the milk comes from happy animals.”
Luke gives me a crash course in cheeses; from fresh goat to soft bloomy, washed rind, hard and blue. The world of cheese is constantly expanding.
“You can try make something, and fail, but you’ve still made something incredibly good,” says Luke.
My tasting begins with a goat milk buche, a lactic cheese which doesn’t contain rennet. It has a creamy, lemony flavour. “It’s a very honest cheese,” says Luke. From there we move on to Barry’s sheep milk cheese, which is based on perail. Soft and creamy, it’s similar to the goat cheese, but it contains a small amount of rennet, so it matures for longer. This one is nearly a month old, while others can be as young as a couple of weeks.
Next is an unpasteurised, cloth-bound cheddar. “It’s such a wonderful thing,” says Luke, as I cut off a chunk. “It’s fruity and tangy with a good bite to it.” He’s right, even though it’s a little milder than usual, it still leaves my tongue tingling. “Once you cut a cheese it doesn’t develop in flavour. Most of our cheese is a whole head so we can develop it here,” he says, explaining why often the “mature” cheeses you find pre-packaged aren’t as strong as they could be.
He’s a little unsure about how I’ll react to the next cheese, considering I’m not overly fond of strong varieties. It’s a chevrotin, a washed rind goat cheese, and the softest of the lot. It’s also, surprisingly, more-ish. “It’s like a ‘stinking bishop’, it has a lovely texture, and a barnyard flavour,” he says. “It’s also very nice when it goes hard.”
Our final morsel is a golden chunk of gonedsa, a gouda-style cheese. It’s normally aged for four years, but this one is seven years old. “It’s like butterscotch parmesan,” says Luke, recommending it be enjoyed shaved with a peaty whisky or black coffee. I love the crunch, which he explains is caused by tyrosine crystals – collections of amino acids which form in very aged cheeses.
Interestingly, his foray into cheese began with salami. He read a book about how they used to cure and salt meat in England. “I went on a personal salami making mission. I began curing various meats to see what would happen. Then I ate them and hoped I didn’t die,” he laughs. “I stayed alive, and some of them were amazing!”
When his father bought him a cheese-making kit, his interest in microbiology and fermentation began. Before long, he changed career from teacher to cheese monger, and travelled around the UK, learning from cheese makers and blogging about his experiences.
Finally, his journey brought him and his wife to South Africa. He spent almost a year finding cheese makers, building relationships and working out how to get cheeses from farms around the country to Culture Club in the best possible condition.
He is committed to supporting small suppliers. He keeps them updated with what’s most popular with customers, and even lets them know what people are asking for so they can try their hand at making it, or at least a South African version of it.
Culture Club is compact, so they are only able to make limited amounts of cheese on site. At the moment they’re making labneh, cream cheese, caboc, and are even washing cheese in beer. “We chuck in different bacteria, yeast and mould, let it age and see what happens,” says Luke.
l www.cultureclubcheese.co.za