Held over the weekend of November 17 and 18, the inaugural Halloumi Festival will offer attendees a deep dive into a cheese proving popular all across Australia.
Guests will have the chance to taste more than ten traditional halloumi dishes, such as ravioli with halloumi cheese, Cypriot 'flaounes', 'koupes' and halloumi pies among others, as well as take home a booklet of traditional halloumi recipes.
Two groups of women will also demonstrate the traditional process for making halloumi, while attendees can take part in the cheese-making fun too.
The semi-hard, unripened, brined cheese is traditionally made from a mixture of sheep and goat's milk. Halloumi has been made in Cyprus for centuries and is the Mediterranean island's second-largest export.
"Lately, there has been a sharp increase in halloumi in Australia,” Stelios Angelodemou, president of the Cyprus Community of Melbourne & Victoria tells SBS Greek, “though the producers and their cheesemaking firms on the island of Cyprus cannot supply the demanding quantities."
"The main reason for the supply shortage is that there wasn't enough milk on the island to use to make halloumi," he adds.
The production of halloumi, according to European Union regulations, consists of a minimum twenty per cent goat milk and the rest from cow or sheep milk.
Grilled halloumi Source: Flickr/Ewan Munro
The popularity of the delicious Cypriot export and its supply shortage have resulted in increased local production in Australia. Many cheese producers - mainly in Sydney and Melbourne - began to produce their own type of halloumi but not according to the traditional recipe.
For that reason, halloumi producers from Cyprus will travel to Melbourne to showcase their products and inform guests and local producers about the correct way of making halloumi.
A large and growing number of Australian restaurants now have halloumi on their menus in one way or another.
Women prepare traditional halloumi cheese at a house in the Cypriot village of Astromeritis, 30 km west of the capital Nicosia Source: AFP
"In Victoria, the Cypriot community constantly updates approximately 12,000 restaurants about the exact way of making halloumi," Aggelodemou says.
Halloumi Festival will be held on Saturday, 17 November and Sunday, 18 November, from 12:00pm till 9pm, at the Cyprus Community of Melbourne and Victoria building, 495-497 Lygon St, in Melbourne's Brunswick East.
Listen to the interview (in Greek) with Cyrpus Community of Melbourne and Victoria president, Stelios Angelodemou to SBS Greek by clicking the "Play" button on the main photo
