Best analogy is white bread vs sourdough. The extra bacteria hanging around make for a more complex, but less consistent flavour. The flavour will vary by seaso

Best analogy is white bread vs sourdough. The extra bacteria hanging around make for a more complex, but less consistent flavour. The flavour will vary by season, by year, and by maturing environment (for example the Stichelton that's around right now isn't nearly as good as what was available before Christmas, to the point where my local cheesemonger has retired it for a bit). Raw milk cheese has terroir by the bucketload. Interestingly (to me, anyway) raw milk can be clabbered. This is the simplest way to get a sense of the complexity raw milk cheese has, by comparing clabbered milk with commercial sour cream or buttermilk (but don't try to clabber pasteurised milk, it's dangerous).