Cheese Making Machinery

 
 
 

Vocabulary

scan	authentic	bound for
variety	slice (2)	ultrasound
X-ray	Camembert	as well as
Brie	air-tight	love affair (2)
wrap	shelf-life	Benedictine
curd	coagulate	monastery
cheddar	across (2)	package (2)
breathe	installation	all the way to
abound	domestic (2)

 
 
 
 
 
 

Video

 

 
 
 
 

Transcript

Green pastures abound in the Bavarian district of Rosenheim. Cheese making enjoys a long tradition here.

So it’s just the right place for ALPMA, a company that makes machines for cheese dairies.

Here, they’re testing equipment to cut cheddar. Each piece is scanned in 3-D, weighted and measured.

Depending on the variety of cheese, this slicer can also employ ultrasound and X-ray technology.

Gisbert Strohn, ALPMA Managing Director: “We have around a hundred engineers in-house who work on products like this every day, as well as create new models.

These multi-sound models are among the latest developments.”

A single machine can cost as much as €600,000. Most of the ones made by ALPMA are special orders, since every cheese is different.

But the firm’s best sellers are packaging machines. Around 80% of the Camembert and Brie produced worldwide is wrapped with the help of this machinery.

Soft cheeses like these require special technology.

Gisbert Strohn, ALPMA Managing Director: “This is the classic folding packaging which is used to wrap Camembert and Brie around the world. These kinds of cheese must “breathe”, so you can’t put them in air-tight packaging, as that would shorten their shelf life.”

The village of Rott am Inn, known for its Benedictine monastery, is where ALPMA is based.

In the company’s own dairy, they’re testing machines that can make cheese too, like this coagulator.

This ALPMA invention can now be found in almost every cheese dairy across Europe. It’s used to make cheese curd, a preliminary stage in the production of soft cheese.

The firm hopes to deliver machines like this to India soon.

Gisbert Strohn, ALPMA Managing Director: “They produce a white cheese called “paneer” in India. That’s the next lucrative market in terms of industrial production.

Other markets include Eastern Europe, where people eat lots of curd cheese called tuarog. And in South America there are cheese producing regions that also require this kind of engineering.

ALPMA ships everything from single machines to complete installations that can do everything from slicing cheese to packaging it.

Two years ago, they sent this kind of equipment all the way to Tasmania.

This machine is bound for France, a country that has long had a love affair with cheese, and is still one of the world’s biggest producers.

Germans like to eat domestically produced varieties like Kerkesa, a full-bodied Alpine cheese that’s aged for at least four months.

It’s an authentic taste of Bavaria.

Questions

1. The ALPMA dairy machinery company is located in Berlin. Is this right or wrong?

2. Does the cheese cutting machine simply slice cheese?

3. This is a very high-tech industry. Yes or no? Do only semi-skilled and skilled technicians work at ALPMA?

4. Do they mass produce the same model and market them to dairy farm prospects and clients?

5. Do the for Camembert and Brie have to be sealed in air-tight packages?

6. The ALPMA company only has engineering and industrial operations. True or false?

7. Is ALPMA’s market only in Germany? What are some potential, new markets?

8. What can you say about France and Germany in terms of cheese production and the cheese industry?

 

A. What are some common dairy products in your city?

B. Does dairy have a long tradition in your country? Has it been changing over the years?

C. Are dairy imports popular in shops? Which countries are renowned for their dairy products?

D. Do dairy farms use domestically produced dairy equipment, imports or both?

E. What will happen in the future?