A while back I wrote about local entrepreneur and mother of two, Binuka Joshi, who had set up Theki Dairy – a small shop and kitchen.
Theki Dairy was selling yoghurt and paneer (the soft Indian cheese you often see with a curry), and I worked closely with Binuka to introduce their first soft cheese. Binuka is the perfect example of someone using their initiative to create a better income for themselves and their family. Making different dairy produce creates a much bigger profit than selling just milk, and often lasts longer outside of a fridge. This is essential as most of the dairy’s customers don’t own a fridge!
Binuka has continued to perfect the soft cheese recipe which she called ‘Theki Maid’ and selling it for a healthy profit, but I’m delighted to say this is not where the story ends.
Right: Binuka making her first cheese
Sharing my award winning cheddar recipe
My real cheese making expertise lies with cheddar, as my farm back in Somerset used to produce traditional cheddar that was sold in Waitrose (amongst other places), and the cheese has won awards including ‘Best Traditional Cheddar’ in the 2010 World Cheese Awards.
Making cheddar in Nepal can be a huge challenge. To start with, a product called ‘starter cultures’ is needed, which is added to the milk at the very beginning to ripen the milk, and this has been very hard to source. During maturing stages, the cheese does need to remain at a constant chilled storage temperature, which can be near-on impossible here with electricity outages every day.
Theki Tabla is unveiled
Despite these challenges, our first cheddar has been maturing for the last six months and has been unveiled. Binuka was delighted when she realised how tasty it was, as adding hard cheese to her shop means customers get more of a choice, and she’ll get more income from sales.
Binuka decided to call it ‘Theki Tabla’, which means dairy drum – also fitting since Nepal’s national instrument is a drum. Now we know it works, Binuka is in the process of repeating the recipe to make more to sell in her shop.
Binuka’s first batch of Theki Tabla cheddar
Could progress get much better than this?
The next step from this success is something I could only dream of when I first arrived in Nepal – Binuka is now sharing the knowledge I’ve passed on to her with other dairy colleagues in the region, leading training sessions to improve the quality of cheese.
I went along to help Binuka at one of her training sessions held in Kathmandu for a factory already making cheese. It’s absolutely brilliant to see Binuka step up to share her new skills, and I am confident she will continue to do so, long after I go back home to the UK.
Factory manager listening to Binuka’s top tips
You could count on your hand the number of women in the dairy food industry in this region, let alone those under the age of 30, so success is even sweeter seeing the workers and manager in the cheese factory listening to Binuka with a great deal of respect, and carrying out her instructions.
Thank you
I must admit reflecting on these recent developments through writing to you makes me realise how great these last couple of months have been. All these efforts to share knowledge and reach really remote areas is all worth it when dairy farmers like Binuka then take the expertise into their own hands and continue to share to benefit more of the community. I hope you too are proud of this progress, as it’s thanks to you that I am here in the first place!
Until next time,
Simon
