CHEESE-MAKING.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume V, Issue 475, 11 February 1881, Page 2

CHEESE-MAKING.

To lite Editor

gdj,—ln your last issue I noticed an article on diiiry-farming, suggesting, a a means of getting sale for the surplus cheese made on the Peninsula.tlie shipping of it to England. There is no doubt that tbere is a ready snle for a good sample of cheese, judging from the large quantities of American and Dutch cheese continually arriving ; but there is one question—and that a vital one —which you havo not touched upon, and that is the quality of the Peninsula cheese.

I am certain that there is not one dairy out of every ten that makes cheese that would stand the voyage home ; and to feieh a price in the English market, it is the quality that is looked at. I have seen tons of Akaroa cheese leaving here that to look at you would say was first class ; but come to taste it and your opinion would soon alter: it was simply a conglomeration of curd thrown together in the shape of a cheese, and sold to the storekeepers as a first-class article ; in an outside market where there is no contr.i account running, but where it will he sold for ready money, it is on its merits that it sells, and if the quality is not there it will l>e classed and sold accordingly.

Akaroa cheese has anything but a good name at present, and until our farmers adopt a different system and turn out a first class article that will bear exporting, I sp« no chance of a better price or a readier sale for it. In making these few remarks, Ido not condemn the whole of the Peninsula cheesemakers, for there are a few who make very good cheese, but they are few. lam sure that the Akaroa storekeepers will bear me out in inj remarks, as through their bonds most of the cheese made here passes.

Hoping that the few hints thrown out will be accepted without giving offence to any of our fanners, and that better prices may be looked for, —I am, etc.. VERITAS.