Missy stayed with us last night and this morning we took her to Noosaville to meet up with some friends who are a hiring a boat  for the day on the river.

We debated which way to come home and decided to take a drive along the Mary Valley from Eumundi, through Kenilworth and Conondale and back to Maleny.

Kenilworth is the home of a cheese factory which has excellent products.  We called in and sampled some of the specialty cheeses.  These are lovely for a particular occasion but we really did not need any at the moment.

However, I did buy a 2.5kg block of matured cheddar cheese.  We got a discount (not sure why) and it worked out an $10/kg.  That is about the same price as I usually pay at Aldi and considerably cheaper than standard cheese in the supermarket.  This is a rich, full-flavoured cheese made from local milk in an independent factory which is about 30km from our home.  Also, by buying a larger quantity there is less packaging than buying 500g blocks.

I used my food processor to grate half of the block and here it is in containers, ready to go in the freezer.  I had a little put aside which will be used in the lasagne I am about to make.

The remainder has been cut into blocks, wrapped and frozen.  I have kept some cereal bags and use them to separate items when freezing.  They can be re-washed and re-used many times.  Here is one flattened out and ready to use.

The cheese is wrapped in the cereal bag and sealed in a container to go in the freezer.

As the title says, this product ticks all of the boxes:

Locally made
Lcoally produced ingredients
Minimal packaging
Close to home – so minimal transport costs
Independently owned

What are you able to source that is produced close to where you live?