Punch

Punch is the most recent cheese to be developed by the team at Fen Farm Dairy, joining their other cheeses Baron Bigod and Raedwald. As with Raedwald, Punch was developed to make full use of milk during a time of the year when not all of their milk is needed for Baron Bigod production, in this case the summer lull before the beginning of the autumn run-up to Christmas. Punch is loosely based on an Epoisses recipe, with a tart lactic curd that softens as it ripens into a silky, pudding-like paste. During ripening, the cheese is washed with a combination of brine and a natural colouring, annatto, which also gives Cheshire and Red Leicester their distinctive orange hue.

We had been speaking with the team at Fen Farm Dairy and tasting samples of this cheese in progress for several years before it was launched, making it particularly exciting to see the cheese development finally come to fruition. Early on in the process, freshly demoulded cheeses were sent to our maturation team to tend to in parallel with other cheeses from the same batch kept at Fen Farm Dairy. Our maturation team applied their skills to washing the trial cheeses, sharing the finished cheeses with the Fen Farm Dairy team to help inform their own approach to cheese care.