Ask Will Studd about memorable fresh curd cheeses and his mind goes immediately toward brousse du Rove and a tale of shipwrecked goats.
“There’s a lovely story behind this curd cheese,” Studd says, telling the tale of a shipwrecked Mesopotamian boat that battered up against the nearby Provence coast in around 600 BC and the boat’s passengers – a tough little cargo of sturdy goats – who saved themselves by swimming to shore.
These hardy, now Slow-Food-classified goats have evolved to survive eating only the thorns, thistle and patchwork scrub of Provence’s sun-exposed countryside, resulting in low-yield milk with an extremely rich fat content of 45 per cent that corresponds with an equally low content of whey.
The result of all of this history and geography, says Studd, is “a very, very fresh cheese set with vinegar. Within two days it has to be eaten and then, it’s gone.”
Stories such as that of the brousse de Rove are highly descriptive of the world of fresh curd chesses where, by virtue of their almost non-existent shelf life, the flavours speak very specifically to the region in which they are produced.
“Generally speaking, when you talk of fresh curd cheeses you are talking about the most delicate cheeses and why they’re special is because they really reflect the quality of the milk and where they come from,” Studd says. “It’s really the fresher the better in most cases.”
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Source: Chris Chen
The origin of fresh curd cheese is said to date back at least . This is the original cheese, made from splitting the milk in to curds and whey.
Though Studd acknowledges there is some debate around what constitutes a fresh curd cheese, to his mind the definition is that of a cheese with no rennet (or only a very small amount), no rind and with a high moisture content.
In Italy, this leads us directly to the world of or a creamy ball of pliant . In India we’ll bump straight in to . In France this cheese path will lead directly to fromage blanc – a summertime breakfast favourite when drizzled with a tart plum compote, or consider blending it with cream, raspberries and a little caster sugar to create a fresh and light . In Nigeria they will call this type of cheese wara and produce it from the milk of zebu indicine cattle.
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Even in a relatively young cheesemaking country such as Australia, says Studd, there is a unique and growing fresh curd cheese legacy that speaks directly to the Australian palate; one where and preserving curd-style cheese in oil or brine, herbs and garlic has become like culinary second nature.
“Part of the secret of keeping fresh cheese for longer is to pop it into a brine, which is where feta and haloumi comes from – marinated feta, particularly when marinated in garlic, is a national symbol of Australia that you don’t really see in many other places,” muses Studd. Feta is usually made with rennet and starter bacteria, with the curd that forms is drained and placed into mounds to release more whey, producing the characteristic firm texture; it is then immersed in brine and matured. The process sets it apart from the simpler fresh curd cheeses.
For Gabriel Gaté, host of , childhood memories are made of la caille, the soft curdled milk eaten as dessert nursery food by French children everywhere. Summer holidays in Corsica are all about brocciu, a lactose-free whey cheese made from goat or ewe’s milk with a ricotta-like texture. But when in Australia, for Gaté, soft curd cheese is all about the beauty and the quality of local .
“There is some quality quark being made by producers in South Australia and I’ll often use it to make desserts; to make a cake in the style of ricotta cakes,” Gaté says, suggesting that fans of ricotta might also like to try tossing the soft cheese in to an ice cream maker with a small amount of caster sugar for an easy and light dessert.
Gabriel Gaté with provençale goat cheese Source: Taste le Tour 2015
For Studd, it’s less about the style of soft cheese than the animal from where the milk is sourced. In short, fresh curd cheeses according to this expert are all about goat: “Goats milk lends itself to fresh curd because of its very distinctive, lingering, lemony flavour.”
Spread this curd on some good sourdough and pair with a glass of wine and a sunny day, advises Studd, and you’ve just bought yourself a ticket to heaven.
See how fresh curd cheese is made tonight on , 6pm on SBS. Find out when Gabriel Gaté is on SBS during Tour de France coverage .
