Where there’s a will, there’s a whey

When Julian and Dianne last year subdivided their Apostle Whey Cheese business from their dairy farm, they had to find a way to use the whey on site.

Gin has provided the solution.

Last year, their youngest son Luke purchased the dairy farm, after working for a few years on a 50-50 share agreement, leaving Julian and Dianne to concentrate on the production and hospitality side of the Apostle Whey business just inland from the Great Ocean Road near Port Campbell.

While they were overjoyed to have one of their children take over the farm business, the subdivision left them with a dilemma about what to do with their whey — the by-product liquid left from the manufacturing of cheese.

Before the subdivision, they had been depositing the whey back on the farm for the cows to drink. Whey is considered a good addition to adding energy to the diet of cattle, and it proved popular with their herd.

Now that they have subdivided the 1.5 hectares used for the Apostle Whey production facility, restaurant and shop, they have to keep all waste produce on site.

“It can’t cross over the boundary into the dairy farm,” Julian said.

An approach from Otway Estate about using the whey and turning it into alcohol for gin production provided an environmentally friendly and potentially lucrative solution.

“It’s what they call the circular economy,” Julian said.

“We’re trying to make a product out of the by-product of cheese making.”

The whey is collected by Otway Estate which adds yeast and then ferments it to produce about four per cent alcohol, with botanical flavours then added to the mix.

“We’re sending off about 2000 litres a week and they’re creating about 80 litres of alcohol from that,” Julian said.

Apostle Whey Cheese has two flavours available — Rose Rubellion, with a touch of rose and rhubarb, and Pepper Berry.

“You could add citrus in or other things to make different flavours, but I think we’ll keep it to three or four types,” Julian said.

Julian admits that prior to the approach from Otway Estate, he didn’t know that whey could be used in making alcohol.

“Sometimes you’ve just got to look outside the square,” he said.

“It’s just another product we can use to take advantage of what we’ve got; a way of using the by-product and making money out of it.”

He is aware of a Tasmanian distillery making gin from sheep whey, but not of any others using dairy whey.

In the first few weeks of stocking the gin, Julian has had a positive response to the offering, including three women each leaving with an $80 bottle, although nearly half of that is lost to tax.

“Gin is quite an expensive product; we’re hoping it could be quite lucrative,” Julian said.

“When we make the cheese, what’s left is the whey and that’s about 90 per cent of it.

“They make about 80 litres a week, or about 4000 litres a year, and I can’t drink it all, so I’ve got to try to sell most of it,” he jokes.

Actually, Julian prefers non-alcoholic drinks, but he has had a sip of the gin and likes the taste and aroma.

The circular economy philosophy of trying to turn waste products into something meaningful also applies to the dairy farm under Luke’s management, with recycled effluent making a splash this season.

“It was very dry in the first few months of 2024,” Julian said.

“Luke put effluent on his pastures and sowed some grass and then on April 1 we got 40mm of rain and the grass just shot out of the ground,” he said.

The same happened at the start of this summer.

“We got 34mm at the end of November which put some moisture into the crops, which is really good and the grass is still green, so it’s going to kick it along.

“It also puts more bugs in your soil to make it healthy, so you’re saving on buying in fertiliser.”

Now in his mid-70s, Julian is happy to step back and let Luke take over the farming reins more than 50 years after entering the industry.

Although he grew up in Broadmeadows, Julian was inspired to become a dairy farmer by visiting his uncle’s farms in school holidays.

He bought the farm in 1981, and the idea of making cheese happened after some tough seasons in the early 2000s.

Julian and Dianne completed a cheese making course, introduced Jerseys to the previously all-Holstein herd to produce more protein and butterfat, and changed from July to split calving systems to ensure good milk supply year-round.

They started in 2005 with a batch pasteuriser, only allowing cheese to be made twice a week, but later installed a high temperature, short-time pasteuriser to make cheese four times a week to keep up with demand.

They continued to expand, introducing gelato and their own bottled milk to the market in addition to a variety of cheeses.

“Having developed the farm, bred the animals and made a product that people enjoy, as a farmer you don’t get more satisfaction than that,” Julian said.