Roblog

The Gentle Author went with photographer Tom Bunning to see William Oglethorpe, who makes his Kappacasein cheese under a railway arch in Bermondsey. (It’s incredible cheese, if you get the chance to try it; they do a “London Raclette” that’s every bit as good as you’d hope.)

“‘Cheesemaking is easy, it’s life that is hard,’ Bill admitted to me with a disarming grin, when I joined the cheesemakers for their breakfast at a long table and he revealed the long journey he had travelled to arrive in Bermondsey. ‘I grew up in Zambia,’ he explained, ‘And one day a Swiss missionary came to see my father and asked if I’d like to go to agricultural school in Switzerland.’

“‘I earned a certificate of competence,’ he added proudly, assuring me with a wink, ‘I’m a qualified peasant.’”