Style: May 20, 2020

14 STYLE | report
Lucy took time to learn the
art of cheesemaking while
the facility was built. Photo:
John Doogan Photography.
The milk produced by the Italian water buffalo is turned into
cheese. Photos: John Doogan Photography.
THE CHEESEMAKER
Out in the Malvern Hills is a herd of Italian water buffalo, producing milk that is turned
into mouth-watering cheeses. Wairiri Buffalo’s Lucy Appleton tells her story.
My favourite buffalo is Daisy; she is named after my
grandmother. She was abandoned by her mum – she
didn’t seem to want to have anything to do with her, so I was
like, ‘Right, this is an opportunity to hand-raise a buffalo.’ We
have 50 and all of them have names and are full of character.
We chose Italian water buffalo for our farm because we
wanted something that would not only produce a good
return, but be good for our soft land with high rainfall. Buffalo
have a very wide cloven hoof and they seemed to be very
suitable, so that is what we did. We have 100 acres and half
is covenanted forest and swampland, so hopefully, we will be
carbon neutral or negative. The idea is to have less impact on
the planet.
It took about four years to build the facility because we
did most of it ourselves. Then, we had to learn everything;
how to milk buffalo; what we needed to milk buffalo; how to
make cheese; risk management and get the building certified.
We went nice and slowly.
While we were building, I needed to go get the knowledge
on how to make cheese. It is a bit like if you imagine
someone who starts up a car garage and they are not a
mechanic; they are probably not that useful. I had to make
sure I had the intellectual knowledge and capacity to design
and operate a cheese factory.
So, I started with a goat and learned to make the basic,
easy cheeses. I did a cheese course and learned a lot from
my brother-in-law, he’s a microbiologist, and my friend is a
chemist. Then, I visited two cheese factories in Italy.
Initially, I thought I would only do mozzarella, but then I
realised the milk is incredible for all other cheeses. Like a
camembert is phenomenal; any cheese made out of this
milk is phenomenal. It is high-end A2 milk, so a lot of people
who can’t have A1 milk can have the buffalo milk. Using it in
coffee is incredible too. The milk has a silky, light palate, so it
is a great base for coffee.
Quite a few Indian people also use the milk to make their
own fresh paneer. I was at a market a while ago and this
Indian guy was selling vegetables and I had leftover products.
I said to him, ‘Here, have this.’ He looked at me and said, ‘Is
that buffalo milk?’ and I said, ‘Yes.’ His mouth dropped open
because he hadn’t had it since he was a child in India! I had
six leftover bottles, so I just went and gave him the whole lot
and he was stunned.
You can have a lot of fun with Italian stretched-curd
cheeses, because what happens, from a scientific point of
view, is really quite entertaining.
You can create all sorts of things. With caciocavallo,
because it is huge, we need four hands to create it. It is quite
interesting working with two sets of hands. There is a real
science behind making cheese.
Support Lucy at wairiribuffalo.nz