The story in text - Saint Nectaire stages of making

History of the Saint Nectaire

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From time immemorial, the Saint Nectaire had been made in a much vaster area than now: this extended from the Sancy massif all the way to Aubrac. Today, its 'appellation' area covers 72 districts from the south west of the Puy-de-Dôme department to the north of the Cantal department. According to legend, its celebrity is due to a marshal of France, Henri de Sennecterre (1600/1681) who, living quietly on his land in Auvergne, used to serve the cheese at his table and apparently presented it to Louis XIV at Versailles and it was he who gave it the name of Saint Nectaire.

A decree of 1/12/55 defined it as an AOC cheese. Among the 400 varieties of cheese that exist in France, it is one of the 33 cheeses with labels of origin. It is also one of the most important ones. It can be made in two ways: the first is the farm production using unpasteurised milk from one farm's milking. The second method, recognized since the beginning of the sixties (decision by the Court of Appeal in Riom on 5/9/1961 and confirmed by the Court of Cassation on 26/11/63) is carried out in the dairy. The dairy Saint Nectaire is made with pasteurised milk from several farms which means the typical features of a farm Saint Nectaire cannot be recognized.