The top cheese

By Monique Ebrington
YARRA VALLEY Dairy has taken out two prestigious titles at the Grand Dairy Awards last Wednesday, 3 February. Yarra Valley Dairy cheesemaker Jack Holman won the Innovation in Dairy Manufacturing Award, which comes with a cheque for $20,000.
Mr Holman, a Healesville resident, said he was thrilled to have received the title and grant that will allow him to travel, study and work towards developing new varieties of cheese for Yarra Valley Dairy.
“Winning this fantastic award will enable me to travel to France to research and purchase new equipment and gain further knowledge and skills in the development of a white mould lactic curd-style cheese such as Saint-Paulin and Saint-Marcellin,” Mr Holman said.
“I’m really excited about the new products that will come out of the innovation award.”
With a background in environmental studies Mr Holman admits he entered the dairy industry ‘by chance’, just over a decade ago.
Mr Holman said it was working with cheesemakers in France, who he met while traveling in India, when he first ‘got excited about cheese’.
He made cheese at a small cheese factory on Saltspring Island in Canada for a while and moved to the Yarra Valley eight years ago to be closer to his family.
Mr Holman has worked at Yarra Valley Dairy for eight years and said he hopes the cheeses produced, as a result of his innovation award grant, will be up for titles at next year’s Grand Dairy Awards.
The Yering-based the cheese factory, and cheese shop, also received the Champion Flavoured Cheese title for their Persian Fetta.
The Champion Flavoured Cheese award is a ‘best of the best’ category for cheeses that have won other dairy industry titles.