Abbaye de Belloc

Abbaye de Belloc has a pleasantly nutty and complex flavor that is characteristic of Basque. It has a rich, dense creamy texture and a soft lanolin aroma.

Maturation accentuates this cheese's rich, caramelized flavors, which sometime resemble burnt caramel.

Temperature & Humidity - Refrigerate the cheese at a cool, stable temperature, ideally around 35–45 °F (2–7 °C) in your fridge. The crisper drawer is a good spot because temperatures and humidity are more stable there.

Wrapping & Breathability - Wrap in wax paper, cheese paper, or parchment paper rather than airtight plastic. This lets the cheese breathe while still protecting it from drying out. After wrapping in paper, you can loosely cover it with a bit of plastic wrap or place it in a partly open container — just don’t seal it airtight. Avoid Freezing

Abbaye de Belloc is produced from the milk of a centuries-old breed of red-nosed Manech ewes particular to the Basque region, delivered by farms neighboring Belloc Abbey.

Abbaye de Belloc is also known as 'Abbaye Notre-Dame de Belloc' since it was produced by the Benedictine monks at the 'Abbaye de Notre Dame de Belloc' in the Pays Basque region of Aquitaine, France. They used unpasteurised sheep milk available in the locality and followed a cheese-making process that dates back to 3000 years.

Abbaye de Belloc is a flat wheel-shaped traditional, farmhouse, semi-hard cheese made from sheep's milk. It has a natural, crusty, brownish rind with patches of red, orange and yellow. The rind is marked with tiny craters.

The cheese has a firm, dense, rich and creamy texture. The taste resembles burnt caramel, and there is a distinctive lanolin aroma. The ageing process of the cheese ranges from four to ten months. The younger wheels are made in December, while the older ones are in July. Both types of cheese wheels are sent to the market in April.

The massive Abbaye Nôtre-Dame de Belloc has housed Benedictine monks in the Basque region since 1875. During World War II, the monastery was active in the French Resistance and helped many people escape the Nazis. The monks introduced cheesemaking there in 1959, and for the next three decades, they produced the superb tomme known as Abbaye de Belloc with the raw milk of their own flock. But the monks were aging and dwindling in number, and in the 1990s, they turned the recipe and cheesemaking over to a nearby creamery, although they continued to age the wheels at the abbey.

In 2018, to the dismay of many cheese lovers, they ceased sending Abbaye de Belloc to the U.S. The paperwork demands for export were just too onerous. The monastery was down to about 20 residents, most of them elderly. They lacked the manpower to continue the work and no young priests were joining the community to refresh the labor force.

In 2020, the monks made a fateful decision. They would vacate the abbey, move into a neighboring convent and transfer management of the abbey to Habitat et Humanisme, to use the abbey to house cheesemaking interns, as well as health-care aides and others who can’t afford local rents. The influx of young, strong workers to carry out the production and aging of Abbaye de Belloc, along with some funding from a new foundation, has made export possible again.

If you know the original Abbaye de Belloc you know how compelling it is. If you are just getting acquainted, you’ll note its similarity to Ossau-Iraty, the PDO cheese of the region. It is now made with pasteurized milk from local farms and matured for about 6 months. The hard natural rind will likely be dusted with mold, and the interior will be dense, silky and firm enough to shave with a cheese plane.