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Meet the Italian expat who tickles taste buds of UAE royals

Know the varieties of cheese preferred by the UAE's royal families

From relocating her cheese manufacturing business from Italy to the UAE, to making the UAE's royal homes as her clientele, Laura Clerici has come a long way.

Produced in Ras Al Khaimah, Italfood cheeses are the most sought after locally-produced cheese by the Sheikhs' palaces in Ras Al Khaimah and Abu Dhabi.

Is there any particular variety of cheese the royals prefer, we ask? “They usually prefer the low-fat varieties, but the list can go long depending on the chef’s menu. The cheese is usually ordered to be supplied within a couple of hours.”

Considering the hospitality stories we hear about the royal families and the lavish feasts they enjoy, it doesn’t come as a surprise that they love their cheese! “The preferred cheeses are the low-fat ones like the Italian primo sale, buffalo mozzarella, the ricotta cheese, burrata cheese, fresh cheese for pizzas and the Parmesan cheese that we are importing from Italy,”  she shares.
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Looking back, Laura Clerici, Managing Partner at Italfood thinks relocating her food operation to Ras Al Khaimah was the best decision she made.  The company began its operations at a 850-square-meter warehouse in RAK FTZ Technology Park. “In the beginning, we were second-guessing our decision to relocate our operations from Italy to the UAE, but setting up business in the free zone was the best decisions we made. Having our headquarters in the free zone allowed us to completely own the company without needing a local sponsor.” Not to forget, situating their operations in RAK enabled the company to keep production and distribution costs low.

Originally founded in 1955 in a little town in Naples in Italy, Italfood moved to the UAE in 2009. Laura had come to RAK to visit her family, loved the peaceful pace of the city and started exploring the potential of setting up a cheese manufacturing unit.
Setting up the unit came with its own challenges. “The main problem was that there was no cheese processing unit in the UAE before so we had to explain everything to the Municipality and the free zone authorities to get the approval,” Laura states. 

The USP of Italfoods is producing fresh cheese daily using fresh milk from the UAE milk farms and dispatching the products to the market in 24 to 48 hours. This gives them an edge over their competitors.In the last one decade, the production has reached 3000 to 5000 kilograms a day. The idea for 2017 is to export the Ras Al Khaimah produced cheese outside the emirate.
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Apart from the royal families, Italfoods’ cheese can be found at all the leading retail outlets including Spinneys and Geant in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Al Ain and Ras Al Khaimah. They cater to around 150 clients including chains like the Hilton group, the Sheraton group, Jumeirah group and many Italian restaurants.
anita@khaleejtimes.com