You can buy Renegade Monk at the Frome Food Assembly, at the Bridport and Poundbury Farmers Markets, Kimbers Farm Shop near Wincanton, the Udder Farm Shop in East Stour, Palmer Street Bottle in Frome, The Somerset W**e Company in Castle Cary, Bill the Butchers in Bruton, the Pear Tree in Sherborne, Dikes in Stalbridge and Turnbulls in Shaftesbury. Oh, and it's on the cheeseboards of the Roth Bar &
Grill (Hauser & Wirth, Somerset) and At the Chapel in Bruton...
Our smallholding is too small for us to milk our own herd. Instead, we buy in organic cow's milk from Bruton Dairy (who also supply the milk for Godminster cheese). The whey from the cheese making (a by-product that can be hard to dispose of responsibly) is then used to feed our rare-breed Oxford & Sandy Black pigs. It's a soft, blue cheese (but not that blue) and the exterior of the cheese is then hand-rubbed with ale every couple of days, to encourage the growth of friendly bacteria and moulds on the surface that soften and sweeten the cheese and deepen the colour of the rind. The ale we use comes from the Milk Street Brewery in Frome - so, what with the milk coming from Bruton, this is a genuine Somerset cheese
Rubbing the cheeses with alcohol is known as rind-washing, a process developed and used by monasteries across Europe since the Middle Ages - hence the 'Monk' in the cheese's name. The addition of blue (from a mould called Penicillium Roquefortii) and various other techniques we employ makes this cheese something of a hybrid - hence 'Renegade'. In terms of taste, think of a Cambozola (itself a hybrid between Camembert and Gorgonzola) - but then imagine the outside of a Vacherin or Epoisses. To the uninitiated, it might look slightly alarming - but fear not, its bark is worse than its bite. In fact, it's creamy, yielding and delicious!
