Comté cheese

Comté is a hard cheese from eastern France, made from unpasteurised cow's milk and also called Gruyére de Comté. It is based on artisanal methods that grew up in the Jura Mountains around a thousand years ago, when large wheels were made in summer and kept for months to feed farm families through winter. Each wheel needs several hundred litres of milk, which village cooperative dairies called fruitiéres collect and heat in copper vats before the curds are cut, moulded and pressed. Comté is the largest by volume of the French protected designation of origin cheeses, received its appellation status in 1958 and its European protected designation in 1996. Rules limit the cows to Montbéliarde or French Simmental breeds, ban silage and require at least four months of maturing. Inspectors score each wheel out of twenty, and the best earn the green label of Comté Extra. The finished cheese is pale creamy yellow with a nutty, salty and slightly sweet taste.