Attermire

Pliant, with a savoury, malty and ‘brothy’ finish

Unpasteurised
Cows' Milk

This cheese is no longer produced, if you want to try a similar cheese why not get the St Sunday.

Attermire is a new washed-rind cows’ cheese, French in style, Yorkshire in provenance; with a pliant texture and savoury, brothy, malty flavours.

It is made in Austwick near Settle by former Courtyard Dairy cheesemonger Sam Horton. Sam uses the fresh warm milk of only eight cows, from two traditional native breeds: Dairy Shorthorn and Gloucester. Following French and Belgian monastic cheese recipes, he washes the Attermire rind regularly in Riggwelter Ale developing those meaty, savoury flavours and the attractive pinky-brown rind.

With only nine cheeses made per day, Attermire is a true rarity.

Made by Sam Horton at Crows Nest Barn, Austwick, near Settle, England.

More about this

Sam Horton’s journey into the world of cheese began in 2016 when, whilst he pondered what to do with his recently acquired Master’s Degree in International Law, he started working part time at The Courtyard Dairy. Here his love of cheese flourished and over the next six years he became a dedicated full-time cheesemonger at The Courtyard Dairy. The job took Sam on visits to numerous cheese-makers’ farms and dairies, as well as attendance on cheese-making courses given by Neals Yard Dairy and a Natural Cheese-making Course with David Asher. Sam was hooked, and he and his partner Rachael decided the life of cheese was for them: so much so that they wanted to go into making cheese themselves. And so their cheese-making business, Long Churn (named after the local underground ‘Long Churn’ cave), was born.

After experimenting with several cheese recipes and styles, Sam came across local farmer Roger Cowgill, who had returned to his Mum’s family farm that year to set up a small scale regenerative farm, Low Fields at Ingleton (eight miles away). Roger milks only a handful (eight or so) cows of native English breeds: Dairy Shorthorn and Gloucester. He milks them out in the fields using a milking parlour that he pulls along behind his tractor! Using no fertilisers or pesticides; and rotational grazing the cows on varied grasses, legumes and herbal leys, the milk develops a really rich and diverse flavour.

Sam collects this milk warm three times a week and takes it back to his dairy at Austwick near Settle. Here, after much experimentation he settled on a ‘trappist’ method of making cheese. Trappist recipes were developed by monks in Belgium, Germany and France (Port Salut, was originally a trappist cheese and is perhaps the most well-known example). As the monks’ herds were larger than those on small farms, they had enough milk to make cheese each day, using the milk fresh and warm rather than letting it sit and begin to acidify. This meant that their cheeses developed gentler flavours and supple textures. They would then wash the rind (often in beer) encouraging the pinky-brown hue to grow on the rind, which gives the savoury, brothy and malty flavours.

Sam’s recipe is based on old trappist cheese recipe he found when doing his research, and the cheese benefits from being ‘washed’ for five weeks in local Riggwelter Ale. Riggwelter was chosen because it was the local beer which was the closest match to those the monks in France would have used to wash their cheeses all those centuries ago: a reasonable strength (5.7% abv) and malty rather than hoppy.

(Incidentally, Riggwelter is a local dialect word for when a sheep falls on its back and can’t get back up – it is said if you drink too many of these beers, you’ll end up ‘Riggwelted’ or ‘Rigged’ too!)

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 and rennet. Washed in Riggwelter Ale (hops, malted barley, torrefied wheat, water, yeast).