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ORAL HISTORY

Andrea Cudin

Lira Rossa Creamery

Andrea Cudin proudly hails from the Northern Italian region of Friuli which he describes as a “cheese powerhouse.” For him, though, opening and running a creamery was never an early career ambition. A student of German philosophy, he followed love to Victoria, Texas after meeting his wife in Venice. Frustrated by limited employment options and the food he tasted in American supermarkets, he began studying cheesemaking on his own and returned to Italy for classes. Then, with encouragement from his wife, he founded Lira Rossa Artisan Cheese in 2016. Housed on a 4th generation dairy farm outside the town of Moulton, he makes traditional, Italian, Alpine style cheese in the heart of South-Central Texas. Having introduced locals accustomed to cheddar to styles like Latteria and Caciotta, he marvels at the journey he has taken. “This is so completely different to everything I’ve done in my life before, to everything I have imagined in my life before,” he says, and to him this project is more than a business enterprise. “What we have created here is really astonishing… Artisan traditions are a way to keep people alert to where we come from, to our history… Human life is not just rushing towards the future, disregarding everything that is behind you.”