The Beagle
Feb 22, 2018
The winners of the prestigious 2018 Sydney Royal Cheese and Dairy Produce competition were announced at an awards presentation at the iconic ‘The Stables’ overnight at Sydney Showground, Sydney Olympic Park.
Expert judges considered almost 100 classes of produce from milk through to cream, cheese, sorbet, gelato,yoghurt and ice cream.
Chair of Judges for the Sydney Royal Cheese and Dairy Competition Mark Livermore says the annual entries continue to impress.
“Our exhibitors are very passionate about their craft – after all it is their livelihoods and year on year we are seeing high quality and innovation in the cheese and dairy sectors,” Mark Livermore said.
“Who would have imagined years ago that the Sydney Royal judges would be called upon to adjudicate on the wide and increasing range of products from sheep, goat and buffalo milk and for the first time this year, camel milk?“
The white milk classes were again large in number and hotly contested.
“The judges were particularly impressed with the quality of milk submitted for judging. It is this high quality milk which enables the Australian dairy industry manufacturers to produce such outstanding products,” he said.
As always the Sydney Royal competitions produce some fantastic stories of smaller producers mixing it with the major market operators in their respective sectors and holding their own.
“These are exciting times in the Australian Cheese and Dairy produce scene and the imagination of producers big and small suggests the sky is the limit,” Mark Livermore added.
Our own Bodalla Dairy and Tilba Dairy drew much attention from the judges taking home an armful of medals.
The Beagle was advised that the key factors for Bodalla's Gold winning milk is that it is slow and low pasteurised in small batches which retains that creamy flavour then, hand bottled and labeled within hours of milking the cows while being non-homogenised means that the milk is truely authentic.
Coming a very close second with just 0.33 points difference was Tilba Dairy with their Real Dairy full cream milk.
Bodalla Dairy also won 4 Bronzes; three for cheese and one their ice-cream.
Tilba Dairy had a massive win on the night across the board their awards in milk, cheese, haloumi and taking out the 2018 Grand Champion Double Cream
Via social media Erica and Nick Dibden wrote "thanks everyone for their ongoing support these past few years! In particular our team! and most importantly their girls (cows)!"
Above: 2018 Grand Champions of Double Cream - Nick and Erica Dibden of Tilba Real Dairy
Photo courtesy of Tilba Real Dairy
The following is the final results of the awards.
CLASS: 6 White Milk, non homogenised.
Gold BODALLA DAIRY CHEESE FACTORY BODALLA
BODALLA DAIRY, THE LIVING MILK, NOT HOMOGENIZED
Gold TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL TILBA
TILBA REAL DAIRY FULL CREAM MILK
In CLASS: 40 Cheese, flavours other than fruit.
Bronze BODALLA - GUMLEAF SMOKED - SLOWLY WITH FRESH LEAVES
Bronze BODALLA - STOCKWHIP - TASMANIAN PEPPERBERRY
Bronze BODALLA - DROVER'S DELIGHT - LEMON MYRTLE & MOUNTAIN HERBS
CLASS: 61 Other flavoured full cream Ice Cream or Gelato. Must have a minimum of 10% dairy fat content.
Bronze BODALLA DAIRY - DARK CHOCOLATE AND TASMANIAN PEPPERBERRY ICE CREAM
CLASS: 10 Skim Milk.
Silver TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL TILBA
TILBA REAL DAIRY LOW FAT MILK
CLASS: 31 Haloumi, plain and/or flavoured.
Gold TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL
TILBA REAL DAIRY HALOUMI
CLASS: 38 Cheese, Fetta, flavoured.
Bronze TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL TILBA
TILBA REAL DAIRY PERSIAN FETTA
CLASS: 41 Cheese, mould ripened, to contain white mould. Includes Brie and Camembert.
Silver TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL TILBA
TILBA REAL DAIRY MTN ASH
Bronze TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL
TILBA REAL DAIRY 3 UDDERS BRIE
CLASS: 80 Pure Cream, no additives, more than 35% fat.
Gold TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL TILBA
TILBA REAL DAIRY DOUBLE CREAM
CLASS: S016 CHAMPION CREAM (Classes 77 to 82)
Winner TILBA REAL DAIRY CENTRAL TILBA NSW 2546
TILBA REAL DAIRY DOUBLE CREAM