Claudia: Red Leicester is a raw-milk, nutty,
sweet cheese with a citrus finish,
but no doubt what makes it stand out
is its bright orangey-red color.
The cheese is actually deliberately turned this vibrant hue
with a natural coloring called annatto.
It doesn't contribute to the flavor of the cheese,
so why is it added?
The story goes that Stilton and its blue veins
were so popular that other cheeses,
including Red Leicester,
were having a hard time standing out.
So cheesemakers thought,
"What can we do to make it more popular?
Let's just turn it red." And it worked.
Red Leicester is one of the most popular cheeses now
in the UK.
So, what is annatto specifically?
Is it a colorant? But it's natural, right?
It's a natural colorant from a South American plant,
and it's been used since the early 1800s.
Claudia: Oh! David: Farmers' wives
would've used marigold coloring before that, or keratin.
It's a very deep color,
and it sticks to the fat protein, to the curd,
to the fat protein matrix as it goes through the process.
So as the whey goes out,
it doesn't have much color, but the curd does.
Claudia: Does it stain? David: Yeah, it does, yeah.
And I normally manage to spill it everywhere,
so they call me Annatto Dave.
[Claudia laughs]
Claudia: Oh, it's fresh.
OK, well, no need to do nail polish.
You can just dip your hands in and out.
Do you want to pour it in? There we are.
You got it?
Claudia: OK. What do I do?
Just pour.
Make a pattern. Write your name.
Claudia: It's like a futuristic sort of painting
or something like that.
David: It's a Mochtar.
Claudia: Yeah. It's like a tie-dye.
David: I'm going to switch the paddles on,
and then it'll make an even more wonderful pattern then.
Claudia: Let's see.
When the milk has curdled, Izzie and Craig here
are in charge of cutting the curds
until they reach the size of a pea.
The curds still look a bit white,
as the annatto hasn't fully stuck to them yet
and is still swimming in the whey.
One hour later, the whey is drained
to reveal some very yellow curds.
They are cut and cut and cut into blocks,
with the color getting brighter and brighter each time.
Oh, my God, it's so yellow.
It's, like, hurting my eyes a little bit.
[David laughs]
David: You need sunglasses on.
Claudia: Right, because you're so close to it,
and you know when you stare at the sun for a bit too long?
David: It needs to stand out.
Claudia: The curds are then milled and salted.
David uses this fork to evenly distribute the salt.
That piece is a garden fork.
Claudia: OK.
And we had somebody put a stainless steel tail on it.
Could you take a little lump?
Claudia: This one.
Yeah. It's quite nice.
David: Just tastes salty now, doesn't it?
Claudia: Yeah, just tastes salty.
David: And squeaky.
Claudia: Salty and squeaky, yeah.
I know our American friends will know about this.
Each cheese is then molded
and pressed into what will be a 10-kilo wheel.
When the cheese is two days old,
it is cloth-bound with lard,
a traditional method that had been abandoned
until very recently.
A muslin cloth is dipped in a bain-Marie of hot lard
and then wrapped around the cheese.
Lard does not add to the flavor of the cheese
but creates a seal around it, preventing it from drying out
and preserving its moisture and citrus finish.
It also protects the cheese from molds,
which eat the lard instead of the cheese itself,
keeping it humid.
Mold lives on the lard.
And that slowly eats the lard away,
and then the cheese can dry as it matures.
Claudia: There's a lot of lard there.
Claudia: Yeah, that's not really,
there's a bit of lard dripping, is that OK?
Claudia: OK.
And this edge. Yep.
Claudia: Whoa.
All this lard is very slippery.
OK, and then?
Claudia: Perfect.
Red Leicester ages in a humid room
from six months up to 14 months.
Here, you can see the mold building up
and starting to do what David wants it to do:
eat away the lard and leave the cheese intact.
In fact, despite its moldy appearance,
the cheese will have a nutty, sweet taste
with a citrus finish.
The lard stays on the cheese
and is only removed when it is ready to be sold.
Larding as well as using raw milk to make Red Leicester
were two traditions that had been lost.
Like other cheeses in the UK,
Red Leicester suffered the rationing of World War II,
and farms either stopped making it
or abandoned traditional methods.
It was David who brought this traditional recipe back
after over 50 years.
David: Those colors on there are amazing.
Claudia: It's quite a contrast with the orange.
Yeah, you cannot do this job if you don't like cheese.
Yeah, I like that it is a bit crumbly,
but it still holds its shape.
Yeah, but it's kind of meaty.
We're looking for a meaty texture.
Claudia: Yeah.
Mm! Ooh.
Yeah, I really like this combination of textures, actually.
It has nice, sharp flavor.
David: Yeah, that's quite citrusy, that.
So when you break a piece of red Leicester,
it should just snap.
There's little white specks,
which are basically tiny little pockets where --
Like eyes in the cheese.
Yeah.
That's what a cheesemaker told me once.
Eyes in the cheese.
Yeah.