Humans discovered the principle of cheese making in the Middle East 7,000 to 8,000 years ago. It is believed that milk, transported in goatskin containers made from the stomachs of young goats, would have curdled because of the natural rennet.

This method would have spread quickly around the Mediterranean and beyond. Curd moulds, whose origin goes back 5,000 years, were discovered in Switzerland, close to Neufchâtel. Throughout their conquests, the Romans contributed to spreading the cheese-making process in Europe and England. 

Quebec Cheese

In Quebec, the colonists of New France brought their cheese-making traditions with them. But, after the conquest, production was limited to Cheddar, the cheese of English origin.

However, until 1965, the Aubin family of the Isle d’Orleans made a cheese with raw milk according to an old traditional process handed down from mother to daughter. Unfortunately, the adoption of a law prohibiting the use of raw milk meant the disappearance of this jewel of gastronomic Quebec heritage.

Quebec has always been a cheese-making leader in North America. At the end of the 19th century, the first North American cheese-making school was founded in Saint-Denis-de-Kamouraska. Since 1893, the dairy school in Saint-Hyacinthe, now known as the Institut de technologie agroalimentaire, works on improving cheese-manufacturing techniques and on research in chemistry, bacteriology and nutrition. 

A new era