Fromage frais, Chevre, Aged Pepato, Blue Pepato—cheese with such sophisticated names surely must come from Europe, right?
Think again.
These are local creations handmade in Davao City by cheesemaker Olive Puentespina, who has been producing gourmet artisan cheese for the past six years from cow and goat milk. They are sold under the brand Malagos Cheese, as Puentespina is part of the Puentespina clan who runs Malagos Farmhouse and Malagos Garden Resort, a 12-hectare inland resort, also in Davao.
It was tending to the farm’s goats—which Puentespina and her husband, Roberto Puentespina Jr., began in 2004—that sparked her idea to produce cheese. An animal science major from UP Los Baños (where she met Roberto Jr.), she wanted to harvest some profit from their goats.
“I guess my animal science background kicked in, and I wanted a ‘symbiotic’ relationship with the goats,” says Puentespina during a recent cheese-tasting at Le Bistro Vert in Makati City, which serves certain dishes with Malagos Cheese. “We took care of them; I wanted them to give something back.”
Through a former colleague at the Dairy Training and Research Institute (DTRI) in UPLB, Puentespina acquired the necessary cheese-making skills. “I hadn’t learned this in college; I had a subject on dairy processing, but that was it,” she says.
Puentespina’s next step, after months of perfecting her recipes, was to put her products out in the market. She met Karin Carmona, managing director of Piecofoods Inc., who is now in charge of distributing Malagos Cheese.
“Karin asked me, ‘Is it OK if we have your cheese tasted [by different chefs], and are you willing to make changes or improvements based on the comments?” recalls Puentespina. “I said, ‘sure,’ and that’s how we started [selling cheese].”
In 2006, the Cheese Club of the Philippines took notice of Puentespina’s feta, and awarded it Cheese of the Month in September. Malagos Cheese is now distributed nationwide in different delis, restaurants, hotels and retail outlets like Rustans Le Gourmet, The Market and Wine Depot.
Malagos Cheese products’ prices range from P850 to P1,000 per kilo for the fresh kind (Kesong Puti from goat’s milk and Ricotta). The aged variety, like Blue Pepato (cow’s milk cheese, mildly aged and with whole green pepper corn) or Blush (a soft, semi-aged cow’s milk cheese) sells for around P2,000 per kilo.
Philippine Airlines is also a client. Puentespina supplies them with Blue Goat Cheese, Blush, Blue Pepato and Fresh Chevre (creamy, fresh goat’s milk cheese) with dried mango, an exclusive product for PAL.
“Our consumers used to be limited to the more adventurous [ones], but this has changed dramatically over the past few years,” says Carmona. “More and more Filipinos have become cheese connoisseurs, and are so appreciative of [Puentespina’s] cheese.”
Puentespina produces all of her 16 cheese varieties in her cheese room in Davao. “Everything passes through my hands,” she says. She has three assistants working with her, cutting the curd, draining the whey, forming the cheese. A small kitchen operation, said Puentespina, costs around P20,000.
Her husband, a veterinarian and a UPLB graduate as well, is in charge of taking care of their goats and cows. “[Roberto] takes care of herd health. We can’t use antibiotics and other medicines, since these might affect the milk,” says Puentespina. “A source of good and constant milk is primary; you can’t make good cheese from bad milk.”
Despite Malagos Cheese’s growing popularity—Carmona says European customers here in the country have become big fans—Puentespina is in no hurry to expand the business to the international market. She is “a wife and mother first,” says Puentespina, who has three kids still studying in elementary and high school: Roberto III, Ingrid and Sophia. “The business will grow with me. I would [rather] focus on quality and reliability.”
Besides, Puentespina is quite content with how Pinoys, who are becoming more exploratory when it comes to food, are spending their pesos not on expensive, imported cheese, but on something homegrown. “In that way, I am already helping the country.”