Cheese makers a winner
Here’s a look at what’s been happening this week in Waikato community newspapers.
The Cheese Barn’s cumin seed gouda has been crowned the 2018 Champion of Champions for commercial cheese. Hailing from Matatoki, near Thames, The Cheese Barn owners Kelvin and Cathy Haigh said they did not suspect the win.
Cathy Haigh said they had won lots of medals for their cheeses before, ‘‘but never won champion’’.
There are two top awards up for grabs – commercial and artisan.
The Cheese Barn had been entering in the NZ Champions of Cheese Awards since 1998.
They also walked away with a gold medal for their cumin seed gouda, and a bronze for their regular gouda, from the eight cheeses they entered.
Kelvin Haigh said they entered what they ‘‘believe is the right cheese for competition’’. The couple originally were not going to go to the ceremony last week, content with their medal haul which had been announced a week earlier. ‘‘It always seems to be the same people who win every year.’’ However, they received an email asking why they had not got their tickets yet.
‘‘They told us they couldn’t say much but ‘I think you should come’,’’ Cathy said. At most, they thought they could win the Champion Dutch Style Award, which went to the aged cumin gouda from Barrys Bay Traditional Cheese. They previously won the Dutch Style category in 2011.
Cathy said it was a ‘‘nice surprise’’ to win the overall category. Each year the Haighs have entered their gouda, camembert, and blue cheeses into the competition. Going forward, Cathy said they would continue business as usual but she would ‘‘hope to win it again next year’’. Kelvin said they were coming up to the end of gouda producing season, but it would ‘‘need to mature for four-to-six months before it can be cut’’.
He said their recipes go unchanged on the most part. ‘‘We won’t make any changes unless we need to.’’ To qualify for the commercial Champion of Champions award, cheesemakers need to produce more than 25 tonnes annually. Kelvin would not reveal how much cheese they made annually other than: ‘‘We make lots’’.
Hauraki Herald
Interest high for new cross
A cross which stood at the entrance of Cambridge was once seen as a sign of hope but to the authorities, it was a health and safety problem.
Waipa District Council removed the well-known ‘‘Homecoming Cross’’, near Lake Te Koo Utu, when work began on the
$3.1 million roundabout at the nearby intersection of Cambridge and Victoria roads.
The roundabout was now completed and interest was building to have a new cross reinstated.
The Cambridge Ministers Association has started a funding drive to raise the
$21,400 needed for a new cross.
It was proposed the new cross would stand where the old one was and it could be in sight within the next few months.
The ministers association signed a memorandum of understanding with the council on the ongoing upkeep of the new cross.
The council made a visual inspection of the cross in 2017 and decided to remove it because it was deemed a health and safety risk while people were working on the roundabout.
The council’s chief executive Garry Dyett said the council had researched to find out who owned the cross.
‘‘It has never been a council asset and was never our responsibility to provide maintenance for it,’’ he said.
Historical documents obtained from the Cambridge Museum reveal the original cross was a gift to the Cambridge community from the Cambridge Electric Power Board.
The cross was once lit by many light bulbs and when it became a target for vandals, an agreement was made to replace it with a floodlit iridescent cross in 1968.
The agreement was made by the then Cambridge Borough Council and the Cambridge Electric Power Board.
The costs were split equally.
After the cross was removed in 2017, the Cambridge Community Board met with members of the public and the Cambridge Ministers Association.
Many people were not happy the cross had been taken down without consultation.
The association wanted to be involved with the cross’ refurbishment or replacement, and showed support for it to be put back in its original or an appropriate alternative location.
The community board said it would work with the association to find a resolution.
The council commissioned a structural assessment in July 2017. The report suggested the original cross was in poor condition with a substantial amount of corrosion within its steel work.
‘‘The cross had so much corrosion that remedial work was not viable and the cost to refurbish would be equal or more than the cost of a new cross,’’ said Dyett.
Those who wish to help with funding the
Neglected land riles resident
Roger Freeman once found walking along Tokoroa’s Matarawa stream relaxing.
Now even the thought of the walk gets him uptight as he pictures native plants ‘‘devastated by poison’’.
For years Freeman spent hours voluntarily clearing blackberry and selfseeded flowering cherry trees from the South Waikato District Council owned land, which the council has invested thousands in by planting natives.
But Freeman’s hard work to see the native’s flourish has been for nothing.
He claims the council neglects the area and then sprays and kills the native plants trying to remedy it.
‘‘It seems to be a council policy not to maintain the reserve,’’ he said.
‘‘Now and again they will come in and make a bit of an effort and plant it up with natives but then abandon them.
‘‘They get overgrown [with grass and weeds] so they spray and start over again. It is a continued cycle which has been going on for a decade,’’ he said.
Freeman said he has approached the council for an explanation only to be further disheartened.
‘‘A year ago I got so p***ed off I got in touch with Mayor Jenny Shattock and she was astounded by how it hadn’t been maintained and that it was totally overgrown. She went back to the council but I went down there again recently and you wouldn’t believe it, the grass was chest high, no maintenance had been done.
‘‘They have since been down and slashed and sprayed but you can still see how high the weeds got and the native plants have been devastated by poison from one end of the reserve to the other.’’
He said contractors needed to be held to account.
South Waikato District Council communications manager Kerry Fabrie said if natives are killed by contractors they replace them at their own cost.
However, she said it was not always easy to determine how they die.
‘‘Parks and Reserves staff carry out onsite audits every month and note any issues including non-compliance to the contract specifications,’’ she said.
‘‘These are passed on to the contractor to rectify. If it is determined that native plantings have been lost due to negligence by the contractor they are required to replace these at their cost.
‘‘It is not always easy to determine that re-vegetation plantings have died because of being over sprayed with a herbicide. We certainly expect the contractor to monitor his or her staff’s practices where it has been determined that over-spraying has occurred to ensure it does not happen again.’’
She said the council replaces all plants that have died each year and maintenance work is carried out four times a year.
‘‘Native species were last planted in the esplanade reserves alongside the Matarawa stream in 2016. Four hundred and seventy plants were planted at a cost ranging on average at $6 per plant, so approximately $3000,’’ she said.
She said the council was looking into making several contract changes to improve service delivery.
South Waikato News