An award-winning County Derry business which produces its own cheese has added more silverware to its trophy cabinet following another competition success.
Dart Mountain Cheese, located near Park village in the heart of the Sperrins, was awarded a silver at The CÁIS 2024 Irish Cheese Awards on April 24.
This contest, organised every two years, aims to reward cheese makers from across Ireland and the UK.
During the competition, 13 judges tasted different types of cheese without knowing the brand or company name.
This year the judges tasted 175 different cheeses from 43 businesses across Ireland, including that of Dart Mountain Cheese.
Their cheese called ‘Carraig Bán’, a fresh, tangy, and mild soft cheese, came away with a silver in the ‘Fresh/Soft Cheese (Goat Milk)’ category.
Dart Mountain Cheese, named after the nearby mountain, was created by Kevin and Julie Hickey in 2010.
Their ‘Carraig Bán’ cheese which won a silver along with two of their other cheeses was scored on aroma, flavour, body, texture and overall appearance.
“Carraig Bán is a lovely cheese when it’s first made. It’s very sort of light, tangy and lemony and then you can age it on,” Julie said.
Kevin explained that 500g of each cheese they entered in the competition needed to be packed in a container without any branding.
Julie, a professional chef, moved to Northern Ireland from Boston 30 years ago.
The couple initially ran a restaurant in Derry city for some time however they later decided to leave the restaurant world behind as it did not fit with their family life.
Julie completed multiple courses on cheese making before deciding to create her own cheese in a cheddar-dominated part of the world.
“We started in 2009 in the house, and then we converted our shed in 2010, then we spent a few years developing the recipes,” said Kevin.
“Julie used to make bread at the start, but the bread was interfering with the cheese so we had to stop making the bread.”
They invested in an old farm shed and converted it into a cheese workshop fully powered by solar panels. They constructed a place to meet people with a direct view of the cheese maturing rooms where hundreds of wheels are ageing.
They first started by launching two different types of cheese in 2014 called ‘Sperrin Blue’ and a few months later ‘Dart Mountain Dusk’.
After 14 years in the business, they have created eight cheeses but Julie hopes to create more.
Indeed, the cheese recipes are infinite as Julie explained that milk from one place or another or a different production temperature might change a cheese made ten kilometres away.
Their milk is locally sourced on the nearby Craigbane Goat Farm.
“You can’t make good cheese from bad milk,” continued Julie.
“I mean the guys we get the goats’ milk from are very diligent and when you go over to them, you can see the care they take of their animals.”
While attending markets, Julie and Kevin say they often noticed that Irish people have a particular taste compared to those from other countries, such as France, who might prefer stronger cheese than Irish-produced cheese.
“ I think a lot of the way we feel about food is in our heads,” explained Julie.
“One time when I was at the market a little girl came up and she grabbed a big hunk of the goat’s cheese and she was happily eating away and her mother came on and said ‘that’s a goat’.
“The child immediately stopped eating even though she had been munching away on it, no problem.
“The child stopped because she had a conception in her head that this was not something to eat.”
Over time, Kevin and Julie realised that they needed to understand people’s tastes to be able to sell their cheese.
“When we first launched ‘Sperrin Blue’, we took it to the market in Derry,” said Kevin.
“A lot of people thought it was very strong. We actually did change our ‘Sperrin Blue’ in the feedback we got at the market.
“We now have a much milder blue cheese with slightly less salt.”
Kevin and Julie wanted to keep the names of the cheese local by using Irish names such as ‘Sperrin Blue’ about the Sperrin hills, or ‘Carraig Bán’ which means ‘white rock’.
“It’s all local names, where we get them from, where we are in the landscape,” said Kevin.
Looking around their cheese maturing rooms there are easily a hundred and more cheese wheels getting old and tastier with time.
“Irish weather is great for cheese, it’s sort of a good relative humidity and reasonably consistent temperature,” said Julie, who dreams of having water buffalo in the back garden to make her own mozzarella but she has yet to convince Kevin.
Julie and Kevin also organise visits and love meeting people interested in the cheese business. Their cheese and chutneys are also available at independent food stores and retailers throughout Ireland.
For more information, visit their website.