Reindeer cheese
Reindeer are the primary livestock of the various nomads of the Great Colassian Tundra. Some roving bands keep a a few head of reindeer and some tribes live primarily on reindeer.
Reindeer are mammals and mammals produce milk, but they are small and under optimal conditions, a reindeer cows can only produce about a cup and a half of reindeer milk in a day, but reindeer milk is very high in fat making very rich cheese.
History
Pretty much every northern barbarian tribe in West Colassia has at least a few members that herd reindeer. Sometimes different groups will claim their ancestors were the first to keep reindeer. Most don't worry about the ancient history of reindeer.
As long as people have kept reindeer, they have milked their reindeer and made cheese with it.
Execution
Most reindeer keeping tribes make "summer cheese" and "winter cheese". Summer cheese is made to be eaten quickly and winter cheese is aged and kept for long term storage, to eat during the winter month when food is relatively scare.
Summer cheese is just eaten with normal meals or as a snack on the trail for short treks. Winter cheese is a little sour and hard and not pleasant to eat as is. It is often mixed into soups and stews as a thickening and flavor agent. Sometimes northern barbarians will dissolve their cheese in hot water and drink it straight. Some southerners have joked that that this is the tundra dwellers national beverage.
"Warms the bones on a long night." -Dabub, Orc Hunter
Participants
Zegdelian gnomes and most tundra dwelling orc clans make and consume a lot of reindeer cheese.
Jórtoca humans and Kionus satyrs make and consume modest quanties of reindeer cheese.
by Eron12 with Heroforge
I looked it up, reindeer males are called "bulls" and females are called "cows". They are not "bucks" and "does".
What about giant reindeer milk?
Giant reindeer are not nearly as common as most reindeer herders would prefer, and a disportionately high number of giant reindeers are bulls, not cows. Giant reindeer cows can make a lot more milk than ordinary reindeer cows, but most reindeer herders want them to feed their milk to their own calves because reindeer breeders would rather rear new giant reindeer tomorrow than drink reindeer milk today. That said, some reindeer keepers are curious and have tasted it. Giant reindeer milk tastes the same as does the cheese made from giant reindeer milk.
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I'm so impressed with all the depth you have on your reindeer-related worldbuilding!
Thanks, I like to think I put depth in many things. My reindeer fixation started when I wanted to give the northern orcs the PCs were fighting in my campaign some exotic mounts and it was pointed out that reindeer are too small to carry human riders, so I said "It's a fantasy world, so we can have some GIANT reindeer, so humans and orcs can ride them." Then it was pointed out that gnomes are the right size to regular reindeer. And I wanted to do some Christmas themed stuff for Worldember and just ran with reindeer after doing a fair bit of reading on real world reindeer herders. Enough people were interested that I kept a trickle of reindeer articles going since.
You are SO correct about orcs needing a fun mount. Orcs on horseback would just feel wrong... giant reindeer are a very fun choice.