Petitte transformed into alcohol |Bitten
The Migneron family, which has produced cheeses in the Charlevoix region for over 25 years, has decided to think outside the box to recover 100 % of its whey, this residue from the production of cheese also called LactUrum.
For more than two years, the family business has worked on the development of its brandy.By the very fact, it became the first Canadian distillery to distill this by-product from the cheese industry.
The basic principle of distillation is to recover materials that have a little less value.Some distilleries will have a vegetable raw material, and others will prefer to have a fruit or a cereal, for example. Dans notre cas, on s'est dit : pourquoi ne pas distiller notre petit-lait pour essayer d'en faire un nouveau produit?
raconte la copropriétaire de la Famille Migneron, Madeleine Dufour.
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Madeleine Dufour, copropriétaire de l'entreprise familiale La Famille Migneron | Photo : Radio-Canada / L'épicerieThe Petit-Fais, a residue to be valued
During the manufacture of cheese, milk separates in solid matters, which will become cheese, and liquid material, whey.
All cheese dairy generates large quantities of smallness. Si l’on transforme 100 litres de lait [en fromage], c'est presque 80-90 litres de petit-lait qui vont sortir à la fin. C'est un déchet qu'il faut gérer en tant que fromagerie
, explique Alexandre Dufour, copropriétaire de la Famille Migneron.
The 200,000 tonnes of cheese produced each year in Quebec thus represent more than 1.2 million tonnes of whey which must be recycled.
Le petit-lait, c'est principalement de l'eau, du lactose, avec un petit peu de nutriments
, mentionne Alexandre Dufour.
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Le petit-lait est la partie liquide résiduelle de la coagulation du lait. | Photo : Getty Images / seraficusSeveral companies dehydrate this yellowish liquid to make milk powder.Usually this milk powder is used to nourish farming animals or in food transformation. Par exemple, dans les produits laitiers, on la voit souvent sous l’appellation substances laitières modifiées
.
For the Migneron family, recovering this yellowish liquid to make it alcohol is part of a circular economy approach, where each stage of a production cycle is valued.
If we are able to recover the maximum of what we reject, I think that's the future. C'est de laisser une agriculture durable, qui est plus verte, qui est consciente de ce qu'on laisse derrière nous après chaque procédé
, dit Madeleine Dufour.
A bottle of Little-Fais lade-Fais brandy is 18 liters of whey that arises from a cheese grinding wheel, which was made from 25 liters of milk, which themselves havebeen produced by a cow (or nine sheep)!
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En transformant son petit-lait en eau-de-vie, La Famille Migneron contribue à l'économie circulaire. | Photo : La Famille MigneronEt pour finir, du petit-lait transformé en eau-de-vie, qu’est-ce que ça goûte? C'est un alcool qui va avoir des notes de caramel, mais aussi en même temps de petits fruits, dit Madeleine Dufour, à propos du Charlevoyou, qui contient 40 % d’alcool.We are going to have a blueberry nose, a nose of small strawberries from the fields.We are going to have a sweet nose anyway that will be very charming.
With information from Gildas Meneu
Watch the report by journalist Gildas Meneu and director Dany Croussette on this subject here.(New window)
