Tasting the Heart, Soul and Soil of Hudson Valley Cheese

Can a taste of artisanal cheese transport you to the place where it was produced?  What can you learn about a cheese maker from a style of cheese, the way the animals are tended or the types of ingredients used?

A while back, I had the chance to visit several Hudson Valley cheese makers and explore the idea of “terroir.”  Loosely translated as "taste of the soil," the word refers to the “sense of place” one might taste in a wine produced in a distinct location, and the concept of terroir is becoming more prevalent in conversations about farmstead cheese.  I found cheese makers more than willing to discuss the merits of cheese and terroir and passionate about their role in defining the character of small-batch cheese in the Hudson Valley.  

Rory Chase and Peter Destler, the founders of The Amazing Real Live Food Co. in Pine Plains, New York founded their creamery on a commitment to serve delicious, restorative “vittles” for their friends and neighbors in the Hudson Valley.  They source their milk from 50 registered Holstein cows that graze in rolling pastures reminiscent of a Norman Rockwell illustration. 

Rory and Peter are clearly dedicated to their mission and their French-style artisanal and probiotic cheeses delight the senses.  

Rory becomes visibly animated as he inhales the “mushroomy” aromas in their aging room, and offers me delicious samples of fresh and aged cheeses.  

Joyce Henion – owner of Acorn Hill Farm in Walker Valley, New York – produces fresh, clean-tasting goat cheeses in the former garage of her split-level home, which she converted into a fully equipped creamery.  

Joyce’s fascination with Nubian goats inspired her vocation as a cheese maker.  

Acorn Hill Farm is a very different locale.  Joyce’s goats browse a wooded area of rocky terrain.  She manages the herd organically and knows each goat by name.  

If you taste the cheese of Rory and Peter or Joyce, you will savor two very different stories, but both are characteristic of the vital cheese making community in the Hudson Valley.  Read more about cheese terroir in my story “A Sense of Place” published in the Spring 2012 “Bread and Cheese” issue of the magazine, Edible Hudson Valley.   

©2012 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved   

Say Cheese!

When you're on the road for days at a time, you sometimes have to take a moment to pull over and smell the cheddar.

Heading North on Interstate 94 in Kenosha, Wisconsin, I can hear Mars Cheese Castle calling my name. What cheese lover could resist this Camelot dedicated to Wisconsin's best since 1947?


The cases are filled with every variety of aged cheese ...

I even discover tasty Wisconsin Cheese curd, an excellent snack for the journey ahead.

Just dub me Sir Extra Sharp.

©2010 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved

Catapano Dairy: Commitment and Care Yield Award-Winning Goat Cheese

A seasonal spread featuring farmstead chevre goat cheese - flavored with lavender and honey - from Catapano Dairy Farm in Peconic, Long Island.

It is the unofficial start of the summer season. I celebrate the glorious weather by dining outside with a delectable spread of fruit, honey, nuts, Long Island wine and goat cheese flavored with a hint of lavender and honey from Catapano Dairy Farm in Peconic, Long Island.

The fresh chevre cheese is alabaster white and decadently creamy. I spread it thick on slices of fragrant golden semolina bread with rosemary from Junda’s Pastry, Crust & Crumbs in Jamesport. The cheese is velvety smooth, with a seductive, rich mouth feel. It tastes bright, tart and sweet like country-fresh cream at dawn.

For this moment of edible bliss, Karen and Michael Catapano have labored 365 days a year.

Catapano Dairy sits on the North Road in Peconic, New York, in the heart of Long Island wine country.

Catapano Dairy Farm has the distinction of being the only goat dairy on the North Fork of Long Island, and one of only two dairies producing farmstead cheese on the East End. One might actually miss the entrance sign, set beneath several large shade trees on the North Road, and nestled amidst a burgeoning wine industry. But, that would mean missing a chance to sample extraordinary goat cheese twice-honored with the highest award given by the American Cheese Society. When you talk with Karen Catapano, you appreciate that there is nothing effortless about creating award-winning artisanal cheese. It is a year-round effort.

Assortment of fresh farmstead goat cheese from Catapano Dairy Farm.

Karen is tall and slender with auburn hair. We sit down to talk in the midday sun at a café table adjacent to the animal pens. An occasional “Baaahh” floats musically through the air. Nearby is a small shop, painted robin’s egg blue, where the couple sells fresh goat cheese and premium soap made from goat milk. Shortly into our conversation, I am reminded that an artisanal cheese enterprise is also an animal husbandry operation, and quite labor intensive. When the couple purchased an existing dairy with 18 goats in Mattituck, Long Island in 2003, they discovered that the bucolic dream of dairy ownership and the intensive upkeep were often in conflict.

“We were like normal people with regular jobs and it just seemed like a totally great lifestyle,” Karen recalls. “We bought this cute little idea of a farm and really had to redo the entire thing.”

Both were healthcare professionals, Karen a nurse and Michael a physician. Their personal interests seemed perfect for the venture. Michael had dabbled in cheese making and Karen was breeding dogs and cats. So they enrolled in cheese making and animal husbandry classes at a farm in upstate New York. Every day was a learning process.

“Our first year was total chaos.” Karen says. “I actually thought I could still work as a nurse a little bit and kind of take care of the goats on the weekend. It was really wild. But we got through it.”

Karen Catapano with the goats at Catapano Dairy Farm.

The investment of time and effort paid off. “We were working 24/7 to get it going and then the second year, we did very well. Everybody knew us,” she says. But, they were constantly adapting the existing dairy to new demands.

“It’s such a totally encompassing business and there are so many facets to it,” reflects Karen. “If I was to do it now, I would do it completely different. I would start with the best of everything, like we have now.”

In 2005 when Michael entered Catapano Dairy Farm Chevre in the American Cheese Society annual competition and won first prize for best goat cheese in the USA, the couple once again needed to reconsider their approach to the business. Success required further investment and expansion.

“We were so happy but we were so not prepared for it,” says Karen. “Now all these droves of people from New York City were coming out. At 2 o’clock on Saturday, I’d be totally out of cheese. We put all our efforts into finding a new property. Either that, or we’d have to give it up.”

They established the current dairy in Peconic in 2006 and are now beginning their fourth season on the property. Large roaming pens are home to 96 goats including Saanen and Alpine breeds. Gentle kids with pristine white coats welcome visitors at the fence line. There is a state-of-the-art dairy kitchen on the premises.

Catapano Dairy Farm is home to 96 goats and a state-of-the-art dairy kitchen.

“There is no other place like this, because of the uniqueness of being on the North Fork, and in a lot of ways, we did it at the right time, because now goat cheese is really cool,” says Karen.

How does Catapano Dairy achieve its luscious, award-winning flavor? “The food is of paramount importance,” says Karen. “I think that’s why we won, because we feed the goats so carefully.” Similar to other aspects of the operation, they found the right nutritional balance with some experimentation.

“The feed is not only important for the taste of the cheese, it’s important for the health of the goat and the whole backside of it that people don’t see,” she explains. “I actually hired a goat nutritionist, and she came and did a whole protein analysis of the hay and matched the grains accordingly and added the vitamins in for me.”

The herd of goats at Catapano Dairy Farm includes white Saanen and Alpine breeds.

Of course, the skill of the cheese maker is a significant factor in the flavor. Michael Catapano maintains a medical practice to support the farm, and creates the award-winning cheeses. His “Peconic Mist” blue cheese was awarded first place in the American Cheese Society’s 2008 competition. He is constantly testing new recipes.

“He is never bored,” says Karen. “He has everything written down, and he loves his variables. It’s like a big chemistry experiment for him. This is his passion.”

Their favorite cheese recipe has yet to be sold. Michael has been experimenting and has produced seven huge wheels of an Italian-style Parmigiano-Reggiano.

“It’s to die for, but he’s not had the time and we haven’t had the surplus of milk to make it,” says Karen. “I think this new cheese is probably going to be our favorite.”

During the winter months, the couple tends to repairs, and Karen is kept busy with “kidding season” in early spring. She also produces a line of handcrafted soap and skin care products called “The Delicate Doe.” Goat milk is rich in proteins and naturally occurring fats which makes it an excellent moisturizer.

Their reputation continues to grow. Catapano Cheese is offered as a cheese share at the Sang Lee Organic Farm and will be sold this summer at a regional food market just opened at the South Street Seaport in New York City. North Fork restaurants offer the cheese on their menus and one even features a Catapano Burger. Karen and Michael Catapano have earned their place in the agricultural fabric of Long Island’s North Fork.

Pristine white Catapano goats greet visitors.

“When you see our cheese, I think that you think of Catapano Dairy Farm, a small goat dairy in the heart of wine country,” says Karen. “That’s really what we are.”

Catapano Dairy Farm is located at 33705 North Road (Route 48), Peconic, NY, 11958.

©2009 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved

Suburban Homestead Cheese

My sophisticated Manhattan friends - and even some who live in Brooklyn - think that I live in the boondocks. In reality, my home is only a mere 45 miles from Manhattan, but I gave up fighting their provincial perceptions a long time ago. Instead, I embrace the idea. I live in the country. I get up at dawn. And in the time-honored tradition of country life, I bake my own bread and I make my own cheese. The only thing I’m missing is a cow and a couple of chickens in the back yard.

Making my own cheese at home is a relatively new development. It’s something I’ve wanted to try since my tour of duty at Cheese Boot Camp. There are lots of resources to help get started. Home Cheese Making by Ricki Carroll is considered the Bible, and the New England Cheesemaking Supply Company offers a full range of ingredients and tools.

For my first suburban fromage foray I tackle a simple recipe – fresh ricotta cheese. The ingredients include one gallon of milk (preferably not Ultra Pasteurized), at least ¼ cup of fresh lemon juice and Kosher salt. The tools – a large pot, an instant-read thermometer, some cheese cloth and a colander. There are a range of different recipes, and most are similar in terms of ingredients but vary in terms of the ratio of milk and acid.

I combine the milk with the lemon juice and slowly heat the pot to a temperature between 185 degrees and 200 degrees Fahrenheit. At this point, the project becomes the proverbial watched pot. As the temperature rises, the acid in the lemon juice begins to coagulate the proteins in the milk solids creating curds.

Patience is a virtue in cheesemaking. The pot must be heated slowly and a gallon of cold milk does take time to warm. As the temperature increases, the curds release more liquid and become increasingly firm. It starts to resemble a milky cottage cheese soup.

Once the pot reaches 195 degrees Fahrenheit, I take it off the heat and let it sit covered for 15 minutes. At this point, I still don’t have what the cheesemaking experts refer to as a clean “break” of curds and liquid. I add a bit more lemon juice and immediately see the curds separate from the whey, a clear, golden liquid.

The curds are drained in a colander lined with a cheese cloth. The cheese cloth is wrapped into a bag, squeezing out additional liquid, and then the bag is hung in the refrigerator for several hours.

The result is a firm ball of chalky-white ricotta …

…. which is seasoned with Kosher salt, freshly ground pepper and chopped dill.

The taste is fresh and clean and the texture is slightly chewy with none of the saltiness of commercial products. I layer the ricotta on homemade slices of artisan wheat bread and garnish with sun dried tomatoes for savory, baked open-face sandwich. I’m also considering a frittata with diced ham and fresh ricotta.

So, is home cheese making science or art? I do feel a bit like Bill Nye the Science Guy, hovering over the range with a thermometer for what seems like the bulk of the afternoon. There is also the question of what to do with the abundance of whey? Seasonings aside, there’s not a lot you can do to customize the results of fresh cheese, and it’s got to be eaten within three days, as it is quite perishable.

The final yield of cheese is only about two cups, which doesn’t seem like a lot considering the investment of time and the volume of ingredients. It would require a vast supply of time and milk to turn this into a regular hobby. So, a back yard cow would make a difference. An aging cave in the basement would help, too, if I really wanted to get into the good stuff like blue cheese.

Still, I now have a greater appreciation for the cheese making process, because I’ve now had a hands-on experience. It will certainly enhance my admiration of artisanal cheeses and the efforts of individual cheese makers who create distinctive products.

Will I do it again? I’m not sure, but I still have this hankering to make my own fresh goat cheese. It would taste outstanding with a cold, crisp glass of Sauvignon Blanc.

©2009 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved

Camp Cheddar

I’m too old to qualify for the draft (although I may never have really “qualified”) but nonetheless, I decide to enlist – in Cheese Boot Camp. (I might have actually given more than a passing thought to ROTC if cheese had been part of the deal.)

I get the first email from my drill sergeant Taylor Cocalis at Murray’s Cheese in Greenwich Village. “Eat plenty of greens (got that covered) and report at 18:30 hours.”

Boot Camp Day One – Tonight is the initial immersion in our tour of duty. The 20 members of our unit – the few, the proud – introduce themselves. Some are food professionals, others are cheese fanatics. One gentleman has come all the way from Florida. “I’m here because Miami is a cheese wasteland,” he tells us sadly. Our drill sergeants are decked out in red t-shirts with military slogans like “Brie all that you can Brie.”

We meet our commander for the evening, Liz Thorpe, a senior officer at Murray’s. She is tall, blonde and attractive. She possesses what amounts to a graduate degree of knowledge in cheese, with a ripe smear of screwball comic Carol Lombard to make things interesting. She’s very funny, but not in a cheesy short of way. In fact, the entire staff at Murray’s is incredibly cheerful and helpful – perhaps a residual effect of hanging around all that fermenting milk protein.

We dive right into our first maneuver, a sampling of 14 … yes, count ‘em … 14 cheeses! It’s literally an international tour of duty with cheeses from Italy, France and Spain. “I don’t recommend 14 cheeses for social settings,” Liz cautions. She tries to get us to understand the nuances of tasting cheese. “Don’t just eat it. We’re going to taste it. That’s slower.”

We learn the basics – visually analyze the cheese, sniff it, and then taste it. Try to describe the cheese. Eat the cheese from the inside out, because the flavor can be different at the core of the cheese.

During the tasting, we are introduced to the different milk types – goat, cow and sheep, and the categories of cheese – fresh, bloomy, washed rind, uncooked pressed, cooked pressed and blue. It is all starting to make some sense. It seems that cheeses are pretty much defined by moisture content, color, age, and flavor.

I run the risk of developing an instant addiction to the stinky Epoisses de Bourgogne, an orange, washed rind, oozy pudding-like cheese. Through it all, the helpful staff at Murray’s cheerfully fills our glasses with sparkling wine and a soft, well-rounded red.

We complete our tasting regimen with a pungent blue cheese. “I feel a little stoned,” says Liz. “That was fourteen cheeses!”

I depart for the evening feeling like a round of calisthenics is in order.

Boot Camp Day Two – We are introduced to Zoe Brickley, Murray’s affineur. She bills herself as the “ultimate layman.” Affinage is translated “to refine,” and Zoe lives underground most of the time overseeing the process of aging in a subterranean chamber far below Murray’s retail store. Zoe did a brief assignment at Murray’s while studying at the French Culinary Institute and decided to stay. We descend to the caves bundled in sweat shirts where cheese for some of the top restaurants in New York is aged to perfection. We are fully outfitted with hair nets and booties. Bacteria is good in cheese caves, but perhaps not our bacteria.

Murray’s basement is a fromage fantasy for cheese fanatics. There are four caves each for different styles of cheese and each with different climates. Each is lined from floor to ceiling with glorious, moldy cheese. There is a bloomy rind cave, a washed rind cave, a tome cave for softer cheeses and a hard cheese cave.

The blast of aromas threatens to assault the senses – musty, mushroom, ammonia, citrus, ash, wet hay, and animal. It smells like a very lively barnyard.

We taste a number of cheeses in their fresh form and aged form to learn the difference in the aging process. Zoe puts out a round of Fleur de Lis fresh and a Fleur de Lis aged. The fresh looks like a mold of pure butter and tastes somewhat bland. The aged version has a chalky white bloomy rind, and has a more complex taste.

Zoe tells us that there are two kinds of cheese makers – the cheese scientists, and the cheese artist. The cheese scientist seeks precision, and the cheese artist wants you to taste the terroir and seasonality of the land. Murray’s tends to favor the cheese artists.

In all we sample 13 cheeses in the cave. A key lesson from our session is that when it comes to cheese, beauty is only skin deep. Ugly is good. A gnarly, brown cylinder of Stilton is far more ripe and flavorful than pale, pristine Stilton.

During the afternoon session, Liz returns and we touch on the history and economics of cheese. We learn that Benedictine monks had a major influence on washed-rind styles of cheese. Perhaps that’s why I consider cheese a religious experience? We blind-taste an addition 14 cheeses with Liz guiding us through old and new world styles, which now brings our grand total to 41 cheese samples. The exercise is designed to heighten our senses and powers of observations. I note that one camper is AWOL and never returned from the lunch break. Lightweight. This does require certain stamina. I feel like I’m developing a bloomy rind myself, and decide to skip dinner.

Boot Camp Day Three – I awake with what appears to be a “cheese hangover.” There are 14 more cheeses to sample during our final series of maneuvers, this time paired with wine and beer. Someone may have to call me an ambulance when it’s all said and done. I add 100 sit ups to my morning exercise regimen, just so I have a chance at retaining my trim physique.

Just before drills resume, I run into a fellow camper in the coffee shop next door to Murray’s. “I went jogging this morning, and was sweating butter fat,” she tells me.

Zoe is back for our morning session on the science of cheese. “It’s all about the milk,” she explains. “Milk is amazing.”

We learn about the different fat content of milk from goats, cows and sheep, and the fat content in milk that comes from different bovine breeds. Quality of milk is affected by breeding, feeding and husbandry.

We do another blind test – nine more cheeses – and train ourselves to note the differences in fat and texture between cheese made from the milk of goats, cows and sheep. Some useful tips – cheese from grass fed cows is often yellow, cheese made from the milk of sheep is rich and high in fat, and goat cheese tastes, well, goaty.

There is even a Mr. Wizard moment, where Taylor makes fresh ricotta cheese from scratch, and coagulates milk before our very eyes.

As if we haven’t already gone completely off the deep end, the afternoon session is devoted to pairing cheese with beer and wine. Instructors Chris Munsey and Amanda Crawford do kind of a battle of the sexes of pairings. He is a beer guy and she’s a wine gal. The best takeaway is that cheese and wine from the same region of the world will often go well together, and a good rule of thumb is to match flavors (grassy cheese with grassy white wine) or wines and cheeses with the same level of intensity.

Turns out I’m a wine guy, too. Amanda’s pairings complement the cheeses beautifully, and while I like the selection of beers chosen by Chris, they tend to overpower the cheeses on my palate. However, Chris’s final combination of Jasper Hill Farm Bayley Hazen Blue with Allagash Black is a winner.

And with that final tasting, we are given an honorable discharge.

So that’s the story of my lost weekend in Boot Camp at Murray’s Cheese. The grand total – 48 hours and 55 cheeses. There’s a reason someone came up with the line, “Everything in moderation.” (Was the author perhaps a cheese-making monk??) My first instinct is to check into the Betty Ford Center Dairy Clinic. It’s definitely time to return to a steady diet of cleansing legumes and organic lettuce.

Final thoughts? Three days at Cheese Boot Camp has been physically grueling, demanding all the senses. I’ve confirmed that a genuine love of cheese is more than a passing attraction. The true cheese aficionado is just a little crazy, and that I probably am. I’ve learned a lot, though. I have a real clear sense of styles of cheeses and milk types, can identify most by sight and smell, and I actually think I understand the science behind cheese. I might even try to make it at home, but if that fails, I know I can put together a kick ass cheese platter.

Note to self. It might also be prudent to postpone that upcoming cholesterol test, at least for a week or so.

©2008 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved

My Blue Heaven

The afternoon is waning, and I happen to mention to my administrative assistant that I’ve signed up for an evening class on blue cheese.

She raises one eyebrow slightly. “Oh,” she says, followed by a moment of discomforting silence. “Blue cheese certainly has an interesting flavor.”

Few people are ambiguous about blue cheese. They either love it or hate it. I fall into the love category. For me, it is an attraction that is deep, obsessive and mildly deranged.

Blue cheese is like the whiskey of the dairy world. Wimps need not apply. You’ve got to have a strong constitution. The aroma resembles that of rich loam, freshly cultivated. The smell alone can grow hair on your chest. But don’t let my clearly obsessive compulsion for the Big Blue scare you from becoming an aficionado.

I am the first to arrive at the upper room at Murray’s Cheese in Greenwich Village. Murray’s is the destination for cheese-aholics in Manhattan. The education staff is pouring wine and setting out square white plates carefully arranged with wedges of cheese. I take a chair at a U-shaped table that will seat up to 25 people. There is a large glass window at the front of the classroom, and below, I can see well-dressed Greenwich Villagers perusing the glass display cases in search of their weeknight cheese tasting.

The class is aptly titled, “Got the Blues.” At my place setting there are six glasses partially filled with different varieties of sweet wines. They range from deep-red to amber to honey-colored. Before me are six triangles of off-white cheese speckled with veins of greenish-blue on a stark white dish. There is an intriguing, pungent aroma wafting off the plate.

Shortly, the classroom is packed, and I am relieved to know there are others like me in the naked city. The instructor is a young man named Chris Munsey, who works in the wholesale department of Murray’s. He has tousled hair, a cherubic expression and an encyclopedic knowledge on the basics of blue cheese.

We follow a plating chart, that maps out our wine selections and corresponding cheeses. Straight away, Chris warns us that our palates are in for a workout. Blue cheese and sweet wines are the stuff of intense flavors.

We start our tasting in the traditional way – the cheese at the 12 o’clock position on the plate is sampled first, and then you proceed clockwise around the perimeter of the plate.

Chris explains why he has selected sweet wines to contrast the dramatic, earthy flavors of the cheese – “Blue cheese tramples dry wines.”

An important word about that bluish green stuff on the cheese – it is mold, plain and simple. But it’s a good kind of mold, responsible for some of the most amazing salty, earthy, tangy and arresting flavors one can possibly experience. If you think you’ve been living on automatic pilot, have a bite of blue cheese. You’ll snap out of it.

“Blue cheese won’t hurt you. It will just make you stronger,” Chris advises.

He explains the process, which involves aging cheese laced with a mold called penicillium. After some time, the ripened cheese is injected with holes, allowing oxygen to interact with the penicillium and create that distinctive bluish-green shade usually seen in certain Van Gogh paintings. Blue cheese loves humidity and moisture and tends to thrive in caves. Nobody knows exactly how it was discovered, but as is usually the case in culinary one-upmanship Italy, France and Spain all claim credit for inventing blue cheese.

As we circle the plate, we travel the world. There is a mild blue cheese made from raw cow’s milk in France and a creamy gorgonzola. We are told that Stilton from England has a reputation for producing strange dreams. We taste a glorious “Bayley Hazen Blue” from Jasper Hill Farm in Vermont and we sample my top choice – Cabrales from Spain. Cabrales has a strong, gritty mineral flavor that practically brings tears to my eyes. The wines mingled artfully with the acerbic taste of the cheese. My head is reeling.

Chris says that the trick to pairing wine with blue cheese is that “both flavors are harmonious, not fighting each other.”

The class is concluded, and I set out for the train feeling slightly intoxicated and a bit heady, and it’s not because of the wine. I’ve had my Blue fix and I feel good. An ordinary evening has tasted extraordinary, and Murray’s has secured its reputation as a Mecca for colorful curds. With all that Stilton in my veins, I am sure I will dream of kings, sea monsters, despots and big blue oceans tonight.

©2008 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved

Vermont Gold

The town of Grafton, Vermont has been called one of the ten most picturesque spots in America. During the autumn foliage season, the views along the historic Main Street are burnished gold. Grafton is a quintessential New England village, the type that only seems to exist in a Currier & Ives print. There is a pointed white church steeple, a country store, a history museum and the Old Tavern Inn, which was built in 1801 and where charming wicker rockers are artfully placed along a rambling front porch.

Another kind of gold can be found in the nearby pastures – “Grafton Gold,” the three-year-old, extra-aged cheddar of the Grafton Village Cheese Company.

Grafton, Vermont is dedicated to tradition, and a simpler way of life, and cheese making is part of that tradition. The Grafton Cheese Cooperative was established in 1892 so that local dairy farmers could turn surplus milk into cheese. The cooperative was destroyed by fire in 1912, but re-opened by the not-for-profit Windham Foundation in 1964. There is much to learn here about the techniques employed to create world-class cheddar.

We enter the immaculate white clapboard structure, just outside the village, where cheese making has been underway since dawn. While parts of the process have been updated, Grafton Village Cheese still uses methods that originated in the 1800s. Long rectangular stainless steel vats are filled with pale, spongy slabs of bonded curds. Two men in crisp white uniforms will turn the slabs by hand. This process is called “cheddaring.” One man moves down along the vat and feeds each slab into a milling machine that shreds it into dozens of squiggly fingers that tumble into the vat. Another man tosses fists full of salt onto the shreds and a large automatic mixer crawls through the curds, turning the mixture over numerous times. Eventually, the other man takes the curds by the handful and packs them into 60-pound size metal boxes, pressing the mixture in carefully and closing the lid. The boxes will be placed under pressure for 14 to 16 hours to squeeze out as much moisture as possible.

In the tasting room and retail shop, Wendy Brewer, the marketing director, willingly answers my barrage of questions while I indulge in a progressive sampling of classic cheddar aged one, two, three and four years. The longer the cheese ages, the sharper it becomes and I tremble with pleasure as a chunk of four-year-old cheddar explodes in my mouth. It is vividly tangy, buttery and nutty all at once.

Wendy explains that the cheese making technique for cheddar is designed to squeeze out as much moisture as possible. This will deliver the dense, crumbly cheddar texture. Grafton maintains high standards for the milk used, which is locally sourced from Jersey cows on 38 farms.

“We’re doing our part for family farms,” says Wendy. She explains that Jersey cows produce premium milk with high protein and high butterfat, ideal for “Grafton Gold” and the company’s wide selection of award-winning cheddars. Demand for Grafton cheddar continues to increase nationwide and the company plans to open a second production facility in Brattleboro, Vermont. Clearly, I am the ideal customer for Grafton. I like modern and I like classic, so I purchase 1-year, 2-year, 3-year and 4-year cheddar. 2003 was a very good year, after all. I also pick up a recipe for Grafton Cheddar Cheese Soup, one of their collection of signature cheese dishes.

Later, in the emerald pastures behind Grafton Village Cheese Company, we strike up a friendship with a couple of “Grafton Girls” – a pair of fetching, honey-brown Jersey cows ready and willing to do their part for “Grafton Gold.”

©2007 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved

Oh My Gouda!

If you travel west on Route 11 -- just past the town center of Londonderry, Vermont -- a battered green farm truck is tucked into the pasture that creeps up to the southern side of the road. Atop the truck cabin roof is a sign, hand painted in red block letters with an arrow that reads “Vermont Cheeses.”

We turn right and climb the dirt road to Taylor Farm. At the top of a small hill is a rustic, fire-engine red cheese house and shop. On the hill beyond, we can see the shiny apparatus of a working dairy. A woman with a kind smile, wearing layers of flannel, strolls down the hill to greet us and takes us into the shop.

The woman is Mimi Wright, sister to Taylor Farm’s cheese master, Jon Wright. Taylor Farms produces award-winning Gouda cheese from raw cows’ milk, totaling 70,000 pounds annually.

“Why, Gouda cheese?” I ask Mimi as she invites us to sample cubes of traditional Gouda and maple smoked Gouda.

She tells us, “That’s what worked,” and that few dairies in Vermont were producing Gouda cheese, so therein was the opportunity. And, as Taylor Farm keeps a herd of 55 Holstein and Jersey cows, it made good sense, since the Holstein breed originated in the Netherlands where Gouda was perfected.

Using toothpicks, we pierce several cubes from the tall mound of traditional Gouda. It is a sunny golden color and tastes rich, tangy and creamy. The maple smoked Gouda is buttery, smoky and sweet and was awarded 1st Place by the American Cheese Society.

There is a window that separates the cheese house from the retail shop. Mimi points out the brine bath and I can see stacks of traditional Gouda sealed in bright red wax and wedges of maple smoked Gouda sealed in chocolate-brown wax, aging to perfection.

Vermont farmers have produced cheese since the 1800s. Taylor Farm is a member of the Vermont Cheese Council. Three-dozen cheese makers produce more than 100 varieties of small-batch artisinal cheeses. Jon Wright has produced his award-winning Gouda for eight years. Mimi prepares all the baked goods for the shop and we purchase a crusty loaf of her oat bread made with curds and whey from the dairy and sweetened with honey. Mimi also sells brilliant earth-colored yarns made from the wool of sheep on the farm, poetically labeled “Yarns from the Hills.”

We have purchased as much cheese and bread as we can carry when cheese master Jon Wright enters the shop. He is dressed in a well-worn navy blue sweatshirt, jeans and work boots, and there are splashes of mud on his cuffs. He has rugged features, a lined face and a warm smile. I ask him how he got into cheese making.

“I tell people we started out of desperation,” he laughs. “Dairy farmers gone awry.”

While most of the money made from farms in the state of Vermont has typically come from dairy products, that percentage has been decreasing as the price of land becomes more expensive. Farmers sometimes have to take second jobs to make ends meet.

“We were looking for ways to add value to our milk,” Jon explains. They were able to expand the operation for a small capital investment. The dividends have been clear. There are magazine articles mounted on the walls, praising the quality of the cheese from Taylor Farm.

Jon Wright is one of a new generation of food artisans, and the joy he takes from his work is evident. He is physically and emotionally connected to the land, and the agricultural products he produces.

“The cows are my life,” he says. “I love them.”

©2007 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved