Metadata
WORK ID: YFA 3267 (Master Record)
| Title | Year | Date |
| WHERE THERE'S A CURD... THERE'S A WHEY. | 1979 | 1979-01-01 |
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Details
Original Format: 16mm Colour: Colour Sound: Sound Duration: 22 mins Credits: Nick Park (Wallace and Gromit) was a crew member. Tim Place - Camera Crew David Milnes - Crew Subject: Working Life Rural Life Industry |
| Summary This is a film that shows the process of making Wenslydale cheese at a dairy in Hawes, North Yorkshire. It was made by a student at Sheffield Poly and has since then been used in adverts to help promote traditional cheese making. |
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Description
This is a film that shows the process of making Wenslydale cheese at a dairy in Hawes, North Yorkshire. It was made by a student at Sheffield Poly and has since then been used in adverts to help promote traditional cheese making.
Title-Where there's a curd.
Title-there's a whey.
The film opens with shots of a village in the Dales and a dairy farmer on his way to work.
Title-Kirkby Malzeard, North Yorkshire.
His voiceover says that he has always been up very early for work and...
This is a film that shows the process of making Wenslydale cheese at a dairy in Hawes, North Yorkshire. It was made by a student at Sheffield Poly and has since then been used in adverts to help promote traditional cheese making.
Title-Where there's a curd.
Title-there's a whey.
The film opens with shots of a village in the Dales and a dairy farmer on his way to work.
Title-Kirkby Malzeard, North Yorkshire.
His voiceover says that he has always been up very early for work and when he retires in a few months, he will probably still be an early riser. Following this are shots of the farm that he works in as the `early man'.
The next voice over talks about the structure of the creameries and then describes what the `early man' does; there are shots of him working.
A young farmer brings the cows into the milking parlour and connects the cows to the machine. He says that he milks the cows in the morning and his father milks them in the evening. The man continues on to describe exactly what he does every morning.
A young woman works in a laboratory and talks about the various cultures and milk starters that are added to the milk in order to start the cheese-making process. Following this is a series of shots showing the milk being poured into a large vat at the factory where the cheese processing starts. The voice over explains what processes the milk goes through to change it into curds and whey and then into cheese. Rennet is added to the milk and is then left for several hours until it becomes firm.
The next section takes place at a different farm where a woman is talking about how hard the farming life is, her husband agrees but then she says that she wouldn't have it any other way. They load a truck with milk churns and then the truck is driven off.
Back at the cheese factory, the curd is cut up into blocks, while the whey is allowed to drain off and the cheese blocks are pressed for several hours. At a laboratory, scientists check the quality of the milk and the bacteria.
The next few shots follow a man who drives a tanker to farms to remove the milk and take it to the milk factory. His voice over talks about the various continents that the milk is exported to; some of it is sent to York to be used in cheese making and at the Rowntree factory.
There are more shots from the lab where the technician talks about the various tests that the milk and cheese go through to check for milk solids and fat solids content. There are shots of these tests.
A voice over says that most of the milk produced on farms is kept in tankers and that the milk churns will be phased out by July 1979. There are shots of a man returning empty churns to a farm and collecting the full ones.
One of the last stages depicted is the packing of the cheeses. Some of them are wrapped in wax paper, some have a coating brushed onto them and some are vacuum-packed and then put into boxes. The voice over then talks about all of the countries that the cheese is exported to and this is accompanied by shots of a delivery van going to different shops.
Title – Special Thanks to Mr and Mrs N Bell Plover Hill Farm Galphay
Title – The Byrom Farm Carr House Farm Mickley
Title – Grantly Post Office Harrogate & District Co-Operative Society
Title – Peter Anderson Gary Bellamy Ken Rayne and all the Milk Marketing Board Personnel at Kirkby Malzeard Dairy Company
Title - Camera Crew Tim Place
Sheffield City Polytechnic 1979
(The credits are almost impossible to read so most of them are not included)
Context
This 1979 film focuses on the process of traditional cheese making and follows the daily goings-on at a rural dairy farm in the Yorkshire Dales. The film was made by a student named Tim Place at Sheffield Polytechnic (known today as Sheffield Hallam) and has since been used in various advertisements promoting the traditional techniques seen in the film. Nick Park of Wallace & Gromit fame worked on this film as a crew member during his time as a film student at the university – perhaps...
This 1979 film focuses on the process of traditional cheese making and follows the daily goings-on at a rural dairy farm in the Yorkshire Dales. The film was made by a student named Tim Place at Sheffield Polytechnic (known today as Sheffield Hallam) and has since been used in various advertisements promoting the traditional techniques seen in the film. Nick Park of Wallace & Gromit fame worked on this film as a crew member during his time as a film student at the university – perhaps this inspired the animated duo’s love for cheese? Other notable Sheffield Hallam alumni include actor Sean Bean and Olympic gold medallist Dame Kelly Holmes.
This film was included in the BFI Mediatheque: Yorkshire Collection, a unique viewing station that was installed at the Bradford Media Museum in 2012, featuring the best, rarest and most extraordinary titles from the BFI national archive and its partnership organisations. Cheese making in Britain has been around since the Romans, but it was the medieval monks who evolved the practice of cheese making as well as creating brand new varieties of the stuff. One of the more famous examples is Wensleydale, which was first created at Rievaulx Abbey in our very own Yorkshire. The very nature of monastic sites is their separation from the outside world, which is why so many different varieties of cheese was able to be developed, as each monastery had its own techniques untainted by the influence of other monasteries or the outside world. Cheese making was largely considered an art or a craft rather than a science, and this film treats it as the former, focusing on the traditional techniques used in the process. Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530s sadly meant that monastic cheese making went into decline, but rural farming communities would still continue the practice, developing their methods along the way. British cheese making faced yet another knock in the 1930s, when the government took control of milk supply, deeming it illegal to produce anything other than government-issued cheddar. Thanks to the work of pioneering cheese fans and the relaxation of government regulations in the latter half of the 20th century, there was once again an incline of production of craft cheeses and a revival in specialist varieties like Stilton and goat’s cheeses. Cheese is most commonly produced via the technique of curdling milk by adding citric acids like vinegar or lemon; adding bacteria also causes the curdling effect by adding acidity. Adding rennet completes the curdling process, as seen in this film. The product at this point consists of liquid whey and solid curds. The rennet allows this mixture to set into a gel-type substance, and can now be turned into “soft” cheeses like cottage and ricotta. To obtain a “hard” cheese, there are many different options available, depending on what variety is required. Sometimes the mixture is heated, which separates more whey from the solid curd and affects the taste of the finished product, depending on the bacterial culture that is produced. Other techniques that can affect a cheese’s taste and texture is ‘stretching’ (mozzarella), ‘cheddaring’, which involves piling the curds up which pushes the liquid whey out, and ‘washing’ which is literally washing the curd in warm water, taking away most of the acidity and allowing for a milder taste (edam, gouda). More often than not, cheeses can also go through a ripening procedure to further enhance flavour and texture. Cheeses are left to rest under controlled conditions from as little as a few days to several years, depending on the intensity of flavour required. Some cheeses have extra bacteria or mould introduced during this procedure, giving us soft varieties such as brie and camembert or hard ones like stilton and gorgonzola. The process of cheese-making is a difficult one; it requires attention to detail and an extremely high level of hygiene. Other factors can affect the flavour and texture of the end result, such as seasonal variations in the milk used. Our cheese pioneers of the 1970s faced problems from health inspectors thanks to health scares overblown by the media regarding unpasteurized milk. Cheeses made from goats or sheep’s milk were also treated with suspicion, but luckily survived the initial distrust of the public and are very popular across Britain today. Regional cheeses such as Lancashire, Cheshire and Cheddar reflect these regions wonderfully as the cheese gets it’s unique flavour and texture directly from the land itself – the soil and grass that the cattle feeds on effects the flavour of the milk used. Regional cheeses are understandably celebrated by people living in these regions as they represent a regional identity. Cheese festivals are popular across the British Isles, with turophiles attending events such as the Artisan Cheese Festival in Melton Mowbray, the Cheese & Chilli festivals held at Basingstoke, Christchurch and Winchester and the Big Cheese festival in Caerphilly are just some examples of cheese-themed days out available in this country. References: P. F. Fox, Fundamentals of Cheese Science http://www.greatbritishchefs.com/features/british-cheese-heroes Linford, Jenny, Great British Cheeses http://www.britishcheese.com/userfiles/file/How_Cheese_Is_Made_04-10.pdf |
