Sparkenhoe Vintage

• Unpasteurised
• Cows' Milk
• Suitable in Pregnancy

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Jo and David Clarke revived farmhouse Red Leicester in 2005 by creating Sparkenhoe cheese.  Before that no farmhouse Red Leicester had been made for 50 years.  From a three-generation farming family, David had been bemoaning the lack of good quality Red Leicester, so his friends challenged him to use his own milk to make one!

Thus, after a short cheese-making course, he and Jo began.  Using their own unpasteurised milk, they followed traditional recipes (including cloth-binding the cheese to mature).  They decided to name the cheese after their farm, Sparkenhoe, which means ‘gorsey nob’ and is the name for the ‘hundred area’ in which the farm is based.  A ‘hundred area’ is a medieval administrative method of measuring land – in the 1300s there were six different ‘hundred areas’ in Leicestershire of which Sparknehoe was one (in other areas these are sometimes called ‘wards’).  Red Leicester had previously been made on Sparkenhoe farm between 1745 and 1875.  Sparkenhoe Red Leicester now exists as the only farm-made raw-milk Red Leicester made in Leicestershire and, in keeping with tradition hundreds of years old, it is coloured red using annatto, a natural plant die.

Find out more about Sparkenhoe and Leicestershire handmade cheese in the following articles:
Pam visits Sparkenhoe red Leicester cheese
The story of Sparkenhoe red Leicester

Check out chef Mark Byron’s twice-baked Sparkenhoe soufflé recipe:

Twice-baked Sparkenhoe soufflé recipe

This product will have two weeks’ shelf life from the date of delivery.  Conveniently, at checkout you can choose a delivery date even well in the future if you would like your cheese delivering for a specific event.

Ingredients: Milk, salt, cheese cultures, annatto (a natural colourant) and rennet.