Celebrate Cheshire Day with us… A word from our Managing Director

Did you know that Britain's oldest named cheese is the regional variety called Cheshire Cheese?

Our namesake dates back to beyond the doomsday book originating in Roman Chester, known back then in AD 70 as Deva Victrix. The essentials for making the best cheese are the luscious Cheshire plains to graze dairy cows to produce milk and salt found in abundance in the Cheshire Salt mines to flavour and preserve the cheese of Cheshire.

Cheshire Cheese was the most popular cheese in Britain for hundreds of years, and at the turn of the 20th century, over 1000 farms made our iconic regional cheese. With the advent of the two world wars, this number dwindled to less than 100 active dairies. The introduction of supermarkets in the 1960s and the flooding of the UK with imported cheap cheddar has dropped the number of Cheshire Cheesemakers to just four, of which we are the largest producers in the UK.

Cheshire is a wonderfully fresh and young cheese with a high lactose content and a wonderful tang of acidity. This flavour profile is typical because we only mature our traditional Cheshire for two to four months. Cheshire, unlike cheddar, is not pressed and has a less dense, sometimes called crumbly cheese texture. The crumbly family includes cousins Wensleydale and Lancashire Cheeses, made with a similar method. 

We want the great British public to rediscover its previous favourite cheese. Feta as an ingredient has grown in popularity in recent years whilst a much 'beta than feta' alternative exists in our traditional Cheshire. We have proudly made award-winning Cheshire Cheese at our Laurels Farm Creamery since 1957. Over three generations have been using milk from cows grazing on the pastures of our beautiful Cheshire Plains to make our unique but endangered regional heritage cheese. 

Rekindle your affection for Cheshire Cheese here... 

Written by our Managing Director Simon Spurrell.