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Cheese from France, Auvergne

Saint-Nectaire

Cow milk is set with rennet at 30–34 °C, cut small and pressed in moulds, then salted. Farms use raw milk straight after milking and press for at least 8 hours. The young cheeses are washed at least twice in the cave and then rubbed and turned weekly for at least 28 days, until a grey, white and brown mould crust covers them.

Recipe

Saint-Nectaire, a photo from Wikimedia Commons
Photo: Unknown author, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
No fixed amounts recordedThe specification fixes ingredients and steps but gives no amounts.
Cow milkFarm: raw, whole, used as soon as milking ends. Dairy: raw or pasteurised, may be standardised in fat[cdc-sn2025]
RennetThe only coagulant allowed[cdc-sn2025]
Cultures of bacteria, yeasts and mouldsHarmless cultures are allowed[cdc-sn2025]
SaltBrine or dry salt[cdc-sn2025]
WaterDairy cheese only, to replace part of the whey[cdc-sn2025]
Starteradded cultures of bacteria, yeasts and moulds are allowed; PDO producers of the Massif Central mostly use commercial starters

Total time across the recorded steps: 24 days – 31 days

Start
Drag the bar or press Play
up to 40 °C

What changes: Starting material: cow milk, used on farms straight after milking

Step 1 of 7
Bring in the milk
Time
up to 2 days
Set
Temperature
up to 40 °C
Set
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
S. thermophilus
Mucor

Output: cheese milk.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
white

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Cow milk is set with rennet at 30–34 °C, cut small and pressed in moulds, then salted. Farms use raw milk straight after milking and press for at least 8 hours. The young cheeses are washed at least twice in the cave and then rubbed and turned weekly for at least 28 days, until a grey, white and brown mould crust covers them. Made in 7 steps over 24 days – 31 days. The longest step, wash, rub and ripen in the cave, takes at least 21 days (Ministère de l'agriculture 2025) and runs at 6–14 °C (Ministère de l'agriculture 2025). Streptococcus thermophilus; wild strains were isolated from milk on farms in the Saint-Nectaire area, while PDO cheese producers of the Massif Central mostly use commercial starters does most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main stepat least 21 daysSet[cdc-sn2025]Wash, rub and ripen in the cave
Temperature6–14 °CSet[cdc-sn2025]Wash, rub and ripen in the cave
AciditypH 5–5.5Set[cdc-sn2025]Salt

What makes this one different

Saint-Nectaire is pressed but not cooked, and farm cheese is made from raw milk straight after milking, then pressed for at least 8 hours. Farms traditionally sell the cheeses white to specialist affineurs, who wash them at least twice and then rub them weekly in damp caves. The rind is a crust of grey, white and brown moulds, Mucor among them.

Milk
Raw cow milk on farms; raw or pasteurised milk in dairies
Ripening
At least 28 days after entering the cave; 21 days for the small format
Size
20–24 cm across, 3.5–5.5 cm high, 1.450–1.950 kg; small format 12–14 cm, 0.500–0.700 kg; fat at least 45 g per 100 g dry matter

Related ferments

Variants

  • Saint-Nectaire fermierRaw milk used straight after milking; coagulation 25–45 min; pressed at least 8 h at 20–25 °C.
  • Saint-Nectaire laitierRaw or pasteurised milk; part of the whey may be replaced with water; pressed at least 1 h.
  • Petit format12–14 cm across, 0.500–0.700 kg, ripened at least 21 days.

Safety

Farm Saint-Nectaire is made from raw milk. ANSES lists pressed uncooked, briefly ripened cheeses such as Saint-Nectaire among the main sources of Listeria, Salmonella and enterohaemorrhagic E. coli outbreaks linked to raw-milk cheese, and advises pregnant women, young children, people over 65 and people with weak immunity not to eat raw-milk cheeses other than cooked pressed ones such as Gruyère or Comté.

Hazards the sources name: Salmonella enterica serovar Dublin, isolated from Saint-Nectaire cheese; Listeria monocytogenes, Salmonella and enterohaemorrhagic E. coli (ANSES names Saint-Nectaire among the main cheese sources of these hazards).

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

The specification says the cheese has been made in the Monts Dore for several centuries and that its name appears in gastronomy in the 17th century, with works citing it in 1786 and 1787. Production grew in the 19th and 20th centuries on small mountain farms, where it became the work of the farmwomen. Makers rarely ripened it, and took it white to markets, where specialist affineurs bought it. A court at Issoire recognised the appellation in 1955.

  1. [cdc-sn2025] Ministère de l'agriculture, Cahier des charges de l'appellation d'origine protégée « Saint-Nectaire », homologated by arrêté of 6 November 2025, JORF of 19 November 2025 (BO-Agri n° 2025-47); the standard amendment was published as approved in OJ C/2026/1835 of 20 March 2026spec
  2. [grizon2023] Grizon A., Theil S., Callon C., Gerber P., Helinck S., Dugat-Bony E., Bonnarme P., Chassard C. 2023, Genetic and technological diversity of Streptococcus thermophilus isolated from the Saint-Nectaire PDO cheese-producing area, Frontiers in Microbiology 14:1245510, doi:10.3389/fmicb.2023.1245510paper
  3. [zhang2018] Zhang Y., Kastman E.K., Guasto J.S., Wolfe B.E. 2018, Fungal networks shape dynamics of bacterial dispersal and community assembly in cheese rind microbiomes, Nature Communications 9:336, doi:10.1038/s41467-017-02522-zpaper
  4. [tinsley2022] Tinsley C.R., Jacques N., Lucas M., Grondin C., Legras J.L., Casaregola S. 2022, Molecular genetic analysis with microsatellite-like loci reveals specific dairy-associated and environmental populations of the yeast Geotrichum candidum, Microorganisms 10(1):103, doi:10.3390/microorganisms10010103paper
  5. [cadelsix2019] Cadel-Six S., Vignaud M.L., Mohammed M. 2019, Draft genome sequences of Salmonella enterica subsp. enterica serovar Dublin strains from St. Nectaire and Morbier cheeses, Microbiology Resource Announcements 8(1):e01361-18, doi:10.1128/MRA.01361-18paper
  6. [anses2022] ANSES 2022, Fromages au lait cru, quels risques pour la santé et comment mieux les prévenir (8 April 2022)gov