I was sad to hear that Saputo is planning on closing King Island Dairy after failing to find a buyer for the business. King Island Dairy played a role in my journey towards being a cheese maker. For me it was my first introduction to what we now call artisan cheese through their brie and camembert style cheeses and how blue cheese became my favourite cheese variety.
In the early 1990s I had a friend who lived on King Island, he would come and stay at my share house when he visited Melbourne. As a thank you gift he would bring a box of cheese from King Island Dairy. Within this box of mixed cheeses was a piece of blue vein cheese. Now growing up in regional Victoria we did not eat a lot of fancy foods. Salami, olives, and kabana where exotic special treat foods, so blue cheese was not something that we had. Since it was there, I thought I will give it a go, yuck! Why do people eat this? On his next visit my friend bought another box. There was a piece of blue cheese. As I hate waste, I thought I would give it another go and it was lovely. I was hooked.
I tell people who are not yet into blue cheese that is like a secret club, you just need to find the right gateway and you are in.
