Buffalo mozzarella - or will cow's milk do?

ANOTHER IMMIGRANT SUCCESS STORY

When we were on holiday in Abruzzo earlier this year we went to a neighbourhood pizza restaurant for dinner - guided by the manager of the house we were renting. We had a big platter of antipasti things to begin with and the thing that most stands out in my memory was the mozzarella. I had never tasted as delicious a mozzarella. I didn't ask, but I'm willing to bet it was a buffalo mozzarella - they do make it nearby in Campania and also in Molise. Anyway it was a revelation. This was not the rubbery yellow stuff you buy in the supermarket to put on pizza. It was creamy, delicate and soft.

So for my antipasti course for my Saturday dinner party I was going to include mozzarella somehow and when I saw the picture for this Donna Hay mozzarella, lemon and mint salad, I decided I just had to source some buffalo mozzarella.

So far, from a shopping point of view I have drawn a blank. I really thought that the Colonial Food Store in Doncaster Shopping Town would have some, but not that I could see. Aldi do have an award winning mozzarella - well bocconcini which is a smaller version of the same cheese, but I do not know whether it is buffalo. This will be my last resort I think. I am hoping that the Queen Vic market will have some somewhere.

I searched online, and indeed there is an award winning cheese company called That's Amore, who are actually not that far away. They have a factory and a shop in Thomastown, and also a shop in Carlton. But I doubt that I shall make it out there.

It's a relatively new company started by an Italian immigrant by the name of Giorgio Linguanti who came here with no knowledge of English or of cheese making around eight years ago. In Italy he had worked in advertising, but the lack of English made this impossible. However, he ended up working in a cheese factory where he developed a passion for making cheese and began making his own. He must have had a magic touch as he is now on to his second factory and employs around 50 people. Isn't it wonderful how people who start with virtually nothing can build something so amazing?

But back to the mozzarella. I'm not really quite sure why buffalo mozzarella should be better than cow's milk mozzarella, but Australia has buffalo - mostly in the far north where they are something of a feral pest, and a few canny farmers have decided to harness a pest into something rather more productive. I gather there is now a herd in northern Victoria too, and That's Amore sources its milk from both herds. It is apparently still a bit of a niche industry and I have no doubt that if I find some it will cost me. I'll just have to try and buy it when David is not around. Or I will settle for the best cow's milk mozzarella that I can find.

Mozzarella is apparently made by stretching the curds - by hand? Surely there are machines that do this now. I found these pictures that show the latter part of the process.

I would have dismissed all the hype about mozzarella if it hadn't been for the experience in Abruzzo. It was a taste sensation and I do hope that I can reproduce it here. And I admit I don't buy the yellow rubbery and tasteless stuff anymore. This is the That's Amore product. Looks good. Now where can I find it?

POSTSCRIPT

The verdict is still out on which was better. Some thought the Aldi cow's milk version was better than the buffalo milk one (twice the price). I think the buffalo one. And I did find the That's Amore one at the market. It was really nice, though not, I think, quite as nice as the one I tasted in Abruzzo.