Barbara Gilmour - Dunlop Cheese

Dunlop Cheese

Barbara successfully manufactured a 'species' of cheese till then unknown in Scotland, being made from unskimmed milk from the famous Ayrshire cows. Her process was copied by her neighbours and 'Dunlop cheese' came into such demand, that whether made by Barbara or her neighbours, or by the housewives of adjoining parishes, it found a ready market. It is suggested that the spread of the cheese to other districts was largely through farmers who had settled there from Dunlop parish.

She was something of an 'evangelist' in the matter of making sweet milk (unskimmed milk) cheese,and being a forthright and energetic character she traveled widely to teach the making of her Dunlop cheese, and so stimulated a nation-wide demand. This demand stimulated merchants to visit Cunninghame, buy Dunlop cheese and sell it throughout the central lowlands of Scotland. Local cheese merchants from Kirktoun also bought up the cheese and took them to Glasgow for sale in the markets.

Barbara's system for making Dunlop was widely copied and extended rapidly to many all parts of Scotland by the end of the 18th century, even where traditionally sheep's milk cheese had been made. "...from "Cheesemaking in Scotland". Nothing but skimmed milk having been used in the process of cheese making in this district, previously. All the cheese similarly made in the western counties received the appellation of "Dunlop" and in 1837 the Ayrshire Statistical Account records that 25,000 stones imperial were made in this parish annually.

The high value which was set on the Barbara Gilmour cheese for the purpose of roasting was very much confined to Ayrshire, where a farl of oat cake or supple scone spread with roasted cheese, and a bowl of milk, or whey, or tea, or cold water, made a highly relished and substantial meal, precluding in many families the use of bacon for breakfast.