Milk processing

Milk processing equipment

Breeding small ruminants and cattle is one of the oldest activities in the Soča Valley. Since at least the Middle Ages, milk has been processed into cheese and other dairy products; so, many objects related to the industry can be found in the Tolmin Museum.

Farmers churned butter in simple wooden churns, and then stuffed loaves of butter intended for sale into special wooden models. The models served as a measure and were therefore of different sizes, but they also differed in the decoration carved into the bottom. The motif depicted was a kind of origin label for the butter or the signature of its maker.

Since the beginnings of cheese making, the “trnač” and “posnemavnca” were among the basic tools of cheese makers. The “trnač” was used for crumbling and mixing the cheese curd accumulated in the cauldron. The wooden strainer or “posnemavnca” was used to separate, drain and transfer the cheese curd to a cheese-forming model.