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Fermentation Atlas

Cheese from Ireland, County Cork

Ardrahan

Ardrahan is a semi-soft washed-rind cheese made since 1983 on a family dairy farm in County Cork from the milk of its own Friesian herd. Pasteurised milk is set with a mesophilic starter and vegetable rennet, the curd drains in moulds, and the cheeses are brined, smeared with an orange Brevibacterium culture and washed with salt water as they ripen for about four weeks. A study found its rind dominated by yeasts and coryneform bacteria from the dairy itself. Made in 6 steps over 28 days. The longest step, ripen about four weeks, takes 28 days (culture (the word on cheese)). Salt is 4.1 % (Mounier J. et al. 2005). Mesophilic lactic starter and Debaryomyces hansenii, the dominant yeast on the rind at mid-ripening do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step28 daysReported[culture-mag]Ripen about four weeks
Temperature31.1 °CReported[culture-mag]Warm, add starter and rennet
Salt4.1 %Measured[mounier2005]Smear and wash the rind
AciditypH 6.8Measured[mounier2005]Smear and wash the rind

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedFarmhouse cheese with no published recipe. Each cheese is about 7 inches (18 cm) across, 2–3 inches high and about 3 lb (1.4 kg).
Cow milk, pasteurised · From the family's own Friesian herd[mounier2005][culture-mag]
Mesophilic lactic starter[mounier2005]
Vegetable rennet[culture-mag]
Salt · For brining and for washing the rind[mounier2005][culture-mag]
Brevibacterium aurantiacum smear culture (BL2)[mounier2005]
Starter: mesophilic lactic starter; Brevibacterium aurantiacum smear culture on the rind

Total time across the recorded steps: 28 days

Start
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What changes: Starting material: milk from the farm's own Friesian herd, pasteurised

Step 1 of 6
Collect the herd's milk and pasteurise
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Debaryomyces hansenii
Yeasts
Corynebacterium casei

The milk comes from the family's own Friesian herd, kept since 1925.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

What makes this one different

Of four Irish farmhouse smear cheeses studied, it had the least acid rind (surface pH 6.8 at mid-ripening) and, with Gubbeen, the saltiest. It is smeared with a Brevibacterium culture, yet the rind ends up dominated by the dairy's own yeasts and coryneform bacteria.

Milk
Pasteurised cow milk from the farm's own herd
Ripening
About four weeks
Rind
Washed, orange-brown, soft and sticky
Size
About 18 cm across, 5–8 cm high, about 1.4 kg

Related ferments

Safety

The milk is pasteurised. Soft smear-ripened cheeses have a high pH and short ripening, which an Irish survey names as a higher microbial risk; in that survey 94 % of farmhouse cheese samples were free of Listeria monocytogenes and all were within EU limits for E. coli.

Hazards the sources name: Listeria monocytogenes, the main concern for soft smear-ripened cheeses; 94 % of Irish farmhouse cheeses sampled in one survey were free of it.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

The Burns family kept a Friesian herd from 1925 and sold liquid milk until 1983, when Eugene and Mary Burns began making cheese on the farm. French buyers were its first fans; sales later grew in Ireland and the UK.

  1. [mounier2005] Mounier J. et al. 2005, Surface microflora of four smear-ripened cheeses, Applied and Environmental Microbiology 71:6489–6500paper
  2. [culture-mag] culture (the word on cheese), Cheese Library, 'Ardrahan'web
  3. [obrien2009] O'Brien M. et al. 2009, Occurrence of foodborne pathogens in Irish farmhouse cheese, Food Microbiology 26:910–914 (abstract)paper