Maffra Cheese Company

Ferial Zekiman — chemist by training, Order of Australia for services to specialty cheesemaking — has been making cheese at the farm at Tinamba in East Gippsland for nearly four decades. She works in a tradition that goes back to 1870, when farmers met at Gibney's Hotel in Maffra to establish one of Australia's earliest co-operative cheese factories. Milk from a single herd grazing meters from the vat, no standardisation, milling and salting by hand. The Cloth-Ashed Cheddar — matured 15 to 24 months — has won somewhere between 35 and 40 international gold medals. The dairy is not open to the public; sold via stockists nationally and online direct.