Whey 'has it all nutritionally': Milk by-product finds a niche market as a health drink

Having been introduced to liquid whey as a child, Rosemary Cleary O’Shea at Tullahay Farm in Tipperary is on a mission to introduce nutritious whey drinks to the Irish market

Rosemary O'Shea who produces liquid whey drinks at Tullahay Farm, Co. Tipperary. Pictures: Denis Minihane.

Little Miss Muffet sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey....”

Despite the fact it is mentioned in one of the very first nursery rhymes that we learn as children, whey — unlike oranges and lemons, or pies or cake — is not a foodstuff we come across very often.

Rosemary Cleary O’Shea at Tullahay Farm in Tipperary describes it as “the yellowish liquid expelled from cheese or yoghurt curds during the production process”, adding that it is “essentially a by-product but it is highly nutritious”.

In a study titled The Benefits of Whey, Teagasc researchers Linda Giblin, Elena Arranz and Alberto R. Corrochano write: “Whey is a milk protein prized for its health-promoting benefits. The biological value of whey is higher than egg and meat protein .... Bovine whey provides a complete protein source.”

The body needs amino acids to function, nine of which are classified as essential and must be obtained from the diet. Whey contains all these essential amino acids, so it is considered a complete protein.

This liquid is a food that is celebrated in many cultures. In Mamushka: Recipes from Ukraine & Beyond, Olia Hercules writes of her grandmother using whey from making curd cheese, or syr, in the dough for Moldovian flatbreads. Homa Dashtaki, founder of The White Moustache, a cult yoghurt company in the US, features recipes for cocktails and popsicles made from whey in her book, Yogurt and Whey: Recipes of an Iranian Immigrant Life, as part of the no-waste ethos of her company. Icelandic chef Gísli Matt uses it in his restaurant, Slippurinn, to glaze mackerel and make caramel and gets credited with reinventing Icelandic cuisine in the process.

Rosemary Cleary O'Shea who produces liquid whey drinks and fresh soft cheeses using milk from their own herd of cows at Tullahay Farm, Co. Tipperary.

Closer to home, JP McMahon in his 2020 book, The Irish Cookbook, has a recipe for fermented onions in whey while its just-published companion piece, An Alphabet of Anair: Notes for a New Irish Cuisine, named for his Michelin-starred Galway restaurant, ends with a butter-enriched recipe for whey sauce.

It’s not just for culinary use, either.

“Whey is an amazing drink,” says Cleary O’Shea, who drank a daily egg cupful while growing up on the family farm in Co Tipperary.

“We were given whey each day as a tonic as my grandmother — who was possibly ahead of her time — believed in its goodness and ability to cure all.”

Describing liquid whey as “a drink that has it all nutritionally,” when Cleary O’Shea started researching its nutritional profile, she realised that her grandmother knew a thing or two when she was dosing her grandchildren.

“It is a complete high-quality protein easily digested and absorbed from your gut. It also contains gut-friendly bacteria from the cheese cultures and the fermentation process. And to cap it off, it contains the electrolytes, calcium, potassium, phosphorus, magnesium and sodium, also vitamins B6, B12 and riboflavin.”

Cleary O’Shea also makes the point that liquid whey is much more digestible than whey powder, a highly processed product which has moved from the world of bodybuilding into the mainstream in recent years.

Rosemary Cleary O'Shea's liquid whey drinks and fresh soft cheeses made using milk from their own herd of cows at Tullahay Farm, Co. Tipperary.

Running a dairy farm near Grangemockler in South Tipperary with her husband, Jim and their three girls, now aged 20, 17 and 13, it made sense to Cleary O’Shea to take another look at whey.

She started experimenting with milk from their Friesan herd and launched the Tullahay Farm brand in 2020. Recently, two of her fruit-flavoured whey drinks, an Irish apple version, which won gold at the 2022 Blas na hÉireann Irish food awards, and one with mango and passionfruit, were on the shelves in Lidl as part of its Kickstart supplier development programme.

Reversing the usual story of whey being a by-product of cheesemaking, Cleary O’Shea also makes a selection of soft savoury cheeses so there’s no waste upstream of the whey production. Available through their website and local NeighbourFood markets, these cheeses will also be available in supermarkets this summer.

While Irish consumers are very familiar with cheese of all kinds, liquid whey is very new.

“Whey is not consumed widely in Ireland,” Cleary O’Shea says.

In fact, Tullahay Farm is the first business to bring liquid whey to the market, and knows the challenge of introducing a new product.

“People are often sceptical because they haven’t heard of it before,” she says. “They think that it will taste like sour milk and don’t really understand what it is.”

Once Cleary O’Shea gets past that initial barrier, she’s on a winner; a sip of the smooth, refreshing drink with a lactic tang, and they’re “completely won over by the taste”.

• Tullahay Farm fruit-flavoured whey drinks are stocked at Lidl as part of the Kickstart supplier development programme, Ardkeen Quality Food Store in Waterford and selected SuperValu supermarkets. More information at tullahayfarm.ie