Dairy owner in Santa Catarina invests in the production of fine cheeses

The beautiful scenery of the Valley of the River Uruguay marks the border of the States of Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul. The municipality of Erval Grande, in Rio Grande do Sul side, lives a creator who in recent years became famous in the region.
Acari Menestrina produces milk and owns a dairy, which manufactures daily nothing less than 19 tons of products.
The taste for activity started in childhood. Acari account that, when young, graduated as agricultural technician and later worked as extensionists of Epagri, the company catarinense of research and technical assistance. Later became administrator of dairy products. It was at this stage that had the idea of opening his own business in 1989.
Currently, Acari is one of the largest producers of cheese from Brazil. According to him, the differential of your business is to make sophisticated products of high added value. A careful work that begins in the field.
On the farm of Acari, one of the main pillars for quality milk production is the care of the pasture. There is no confinement. The cows are raised on freedom, grazing all day. With the milking, the farm team delivers on hygiene.
The farm get 4,500 litres of milk per day, except the farm provides only a small part of the milk going, every day, to factory of Acari.
The company is in the neighboring state, Santa Catarina, in the municipality of Guaraciaba, and receives raw material of 350 creators of the region. Almost all small producers.
In the case of Sandra Scapin and Narciso Milan, which has a 27-hectare site, in São José do Cedro. The couple''s cows are in a shed, lined with sawdust. Is a type of confinement more comfortable for the animals: the so-called compost barn. "Anytime you want to go and rest, they can go and rest and chew on that, coming here to dwell on too," explains.
Sandra and Narcissus has 35 cows in lactation and all are called by name. The most curious is that the cows seem to respond to the command of the owners. And will entering the milking room by calling order.
The couple produces on average 820 litres per day, and everything is bought by the factory of Acari, which pays according to quality of milk.
According to Narcissus, this template encourages the creators. "The higher the protein, the higher the fat, and the lower the bacterial count, the higher the price. Our work is our price. If perfect, the better it is, the better the price, "he explains.
Arriving at the factory, the farmers '' milk is processed into various products: cheese, butter, parmesan, grated Parmesan, hillside, which is sort of a half cure. And two cheeses made with sheep''s milk: pecorino sardo and pecorino romano.
But the main product of the House is a yellow cheese, the same family of Parmesan, with Italian recipe: grana padano-that here in Brazil it is called grana-type cheese.
The name comes from white gránulos money that form the mass of cheese. And padano comes from Padania, the region of the Po River Valley in Northern Italy.
"It''s an ancient recipe. As was done for 1000 years ago in the region of Padania. When the monks began making the grana padano. We import a whole factory of Italy. Is an ancient recipe and a recipe needs ", explains Acari.
Dena lazzari is one of the 80 people who work in the dairy. Daughter of small milk producers, born Guaraciaba, she graduated as an engineer and now works in quality control in the industry. "It''s fantastic. I love what I do. And with all this Italian tradition. Gives a greater passion, "he says.
The final step in the production of cheese is matured, that occurs in a room filling his eyes. It''s a maze of hallways and high shelves. In all, the dairy has the ability to make the maturation of 18,500 cheeses at the same time.
Maturation lasts at least a year and each cheese must be brushed every fifteen days, with the help of equipment.
"He comes with more than 40% humidity and the product will ripens, will lose moisture. With that he starts acquiring taste, flavor. Typical of the final product, "explains Acari.
It is during the ripening cheese will form white spots, the gránulos, typical of the product, how do you explain Aline Menestrina, daughter of Acari: "Are calcium crystals that form along the ripening of the cheese. The more gránulos the greater the ripening of the cheese, "he explains.
Acari explains that the grana padano accounts for half of the total turnover of the dairy, which already run more than 100,000,000 dollars per year. The product is sold to restaurants and supermarkets from all regions of the country.
"We had a growth of 60% in 2015. We''re going to grow in 2016 more 40% ".