From the collection of the milk to ageing in the natural caves of Combalou, every step takes part in the identity of Roquefort Carles. Since 1927, Maison Carles has carried on an artisanal craft passed down from generation to generation.
Contents · Chapters I · II · III
A Roquefort Carles is born three times: in the meadow, under expert hands, in the cave. Each step has its own rhythm. Maison Carles rushes none of them.
Pillar I · Upstream
Each morning, the raw sheep's milk is collected from thirteen partner producers of Maison Carles. Some of these partnerships go back several decades. Processed the very day it is collected, it keeps all the richness of raw milk.
Raw milk keeps the memory of its month. Spring grass, summer flowers, autumn hay: each season leaves its signature in the cheese. Every Roquefort naturally expresses the nuances of the season it comes from.
Over the years, a relationship of trust has been built with our partner producers. This closeness fosters mutual understanding, a shared standard and constant attention to the quality of the milk.
Every collection is identified and every delivery fully traced. This traceability makes it possible to know, for each Roquefort, the origin of the milk used to make it.
Le choix du lait cru, collecté chaque matin auprès de nos treize éleveurs partenaires, détermine l’identité aromatique de chaque meule. La race de brebis utilisée la Lacaune, produit un lait d’une richesse en matière grasse incomparable. C’est ce travail du lait cru, non pasteurisé, qui préserve la microflore naturelle indispensable au développement du Penicillium.
Pillar II · The crafting
Opening · The bread
The Maison cultivates its own Penicillium roqueforti, on rye bread left in the cave month after month. The greenish mould that grows on it is the Carles strain, maintained since 1927. Each new loaf takes over from the previous one, the way a sourdough is renewed.
This ancestral method has been almost entirely replaced by industrial strains bought in vials. The Maison continues, for the continuity of taste, and for the signature it imparts to every batch.
Raw milk enters the vat in the afternoon. Rennet, salt, and the house-cultivated Penicillium are added. Curdling happens slowly, over several hours, without thermal acceleration. The setting time belongs to the day's milk.
The curd is cut by hand, with a curd-knife, at the pace the paste demands. Each cheese is then placed in a mould one by one, drained without pressure, never stacked. No rotating tool replaces the hand. Every cylinder stays identifiable.
With dry salt, face by face. We rub, we wait for the salt to penetrate, we turn, we start again. The future rind takes its character here. The gesture is the same as François's; Delphine still carries it, as Jacques did before her.
A few days of pre-maturation. Each piece is watched one by one: firmness to the touch, rise of the blue, hold of the paste. Once the rind has set, the cheeses descend into the cave. They do not come back out for several months.
L’étape de caillage et salage est réalisée à la main par nos fromagers, sans recours aux automates. Ces gestes manuels transmis de génération en génération, en opposition aux process industriels, garantissent l’irrégularité chère aux connaisseurs. La vitalité de notre Penicillium maison, cultivé sur pain de seigle en cave, en est le garant. Le cahier des charges de l’AOP protège et encadre chacune de ces pratiques séculaires.
I am the third.
One single hand turning the cheese.
Pillar III · Time
The cheeses descend into the cave. They are placed on oak travées: raw boards, nourished over the years by a microflora specific to the Maison. Each board is an ecosystem. The cheeses leave on them ferments that carry over from one batch to the next. Maison Carles is one of the last to still age on wood.
year-round
Combalou air
natural ventilation
in natural caves
Ageing lasts at least three months for AOP Roquefort, until the cheese asks to come out. The cheeses are turned regularly, by hand, moved on the boards according to their progress. No automatic schedule. Each piece is given the time it claims.
The oak travée is not an aesthetic choice. Stainless-steel boards, widely adopted by the industry, are easier to wash and quicker to maintain. They are also neutral, so they transmit nothing. Wood, on the other hand, carries a house microflora that takes part in the signature of Roquefort Carles. To remove it would be to lose part of what makes the taste.
The caves are a natural geological fault, carved millennia ago into the Combalou Rock. Fissures in the rock, the fleurines, constantly ventilate the galleries. The air that flows through comes from the mountain. It is cold, humid, regulated. The temperature holds between 7 and 10 degrees, humidity near 95%, year-round, without any human adjustment.
It is in these conditions that Roquefort invented itself, several centuries ago. No artificial cave, however efficient, exactly reproduces that blend of stability and breath. The affineurs who descend into these caves walk through a current of air that has never changed.
The cheese is watched, turned, moved. It is not rushed. When it is ready, it says so: the colour of its rind, the firmness of its paste, the spread of its blue. The affineur has been reading those signs for a lifetime. It is the last gesture of the crafting, and the longest.
L’affinage traditionnel se déploie dans les caves du Combalou sur des travées en chêne séculaires. Ces caves naturelles du Combalou, traversées par les fleurines, maintiennent naturellement la température et l’humidité requises tout au long du cycle. La durée exacte, autrement dit combien de temps d’affinage est nécessaire, dépend de chaque meule et de la saison.
Au-dessus des caves, le plateau calcaire qui domine le village et les vastes étendues du Larzac nourrissent les troupeaux dont nous tirons cette tradition aveyronnaise du lait de brebis. Une fois la meule prête, elle révèle toute sa profondeur dans nos alliances avec les grands vins doux ou, plus simplement, autour d'une assiette de noix et bleu pour une dégustation sans détour. Du lait à la meule, tous ces gestes se tiennent au même endroit : notre fromagerie de Roquefort, à Roquefort-sur-Soulzon.
The cheese tells us when it is ready.
Not the other way round.
Wood side
Raw boards, retooled each season, never washed with hot water. Between their fibres they keep the microflora left by the cheeses of the previous years. Each travée is a living heritage, passed from batch to batch.
ferment side
Stone side
A rock fissured by time, a cave that ventilates itself. Air passes through the fleurines, arriving from the mountain. Seven to ten degrees, ninety-five percent humidity, year-round. No sensor adjusts anything.
breath side
Colophon
To continue
The cheese is made. What remains is understanding it on the palate.
Retrouvez toutes les étapes en détail dans notre guide complet sur la fabrication du Roquefort Carles.
