Friday, October 06, 2006

Cheese: Mungalli Creek

Mungalli Creek is a bio-dynamic dairy located in far north Queensland and they produce a range of products that include milk, yoghurt, cheese and dips. The cheese I'm looking at today is one that is very well known to Italians - Ricotta!

ricotta

Cheese Maker:
Mungalli Creek
Cheese Name: Ricotta
Location: Brooks Road, Millaa Millaa

Mungalli Creek has a tasting and tea room called Out of the Whey and it's open daily from 10am-4pm.

The dairy uses bio-dynamic practice as developed by Dr Rudolph Steiner in the 1920's. While they don't use artificial chemicals or fertilisers they do use something called Preparation 500. This is basically manure packed into corn horns and buried over winter. The manure converts into colloidal humus and is said to help develop soil structure and encourage worms and other soil micro-organisms. With healthy soil you get healthy feed and in turn healthy cows.

I often used Ricotta in recipes on this blog and have always stressed the important of avoiding those bland supermarket tubs of substances that bear no real resemblance to ricotta. While I am a supporter of the basket pressed delicatessen versions, this type of ricotta is something I use when I just want to enjoy the cheese as it is. I think is as close as you can get to ricotta you've made yourself.

ricotta

It's gorgeously dense and the colour of double cream - you can't help but spread it thickly on some toasted bread - which is exactly what I did, using the Seeded Orange Soda Bread.

bread

Thickly sliced and grilled until golden, a thick layer of creamy ricotta and for sweetness, a generous drizzle of honey. A slightly decadent way to start the day.

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5 comments

  1. You know, I've never quite got my head around Ricotta or Cottage cheese for that matter, but your Mungalli Creek looks rather good! Did you get it from Ripe?

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  2. I must admit I'm not fond of cottage cheese at all for a combination of reasons - good ricotta can be a kind of guilt free cream once it's been sweetened, honey if you want to be good, icing sugar if you don't. Ripe does sell it but this is from Macro in Richmond.

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  3. I'm loving all your cheese posts, including this!

    Paz

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  4. I absolutely adore Mungalli Creek products. I've been to "Out of the Whey" a couple of times (it's a regular when I'm up visit my Dad in FNQ). My favourite product would have to be their biodynamic yoghurt, which I blogged here.

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  5. Thanks Paz - I'm enjoying eating the cheeses ;)

    Mellie - I love their name of their shop, it makes me laugh. It's lucky for the rest of us that we don't have to travel that far to get Mungalli Creek products. I haven't tried their cream yet..but I will!

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