cheeseunderground 20-year cheddar, aged cheddar, cheddar, justin aprahamian, justin carlisle, L'Etoile, tony hook, tory miller, Wisconsin cheese

Hooks Donate $40,000 from 20-Year Cheddar

During the next few days, you’re going to hear a lot about Hook’s 20-year Cheddar.

You’re going to hear about how it debuted at a fancy dinner at L’Etoile in downtown Madison, where three James Beard award-winning chefs prepared a seven-course dinner for 70 people.

You’re going to hear about how expensive it is – $209 a pound – and how there’s very little to be had, because most of it is pre-sold or already reserved.

You’re going to hear about how surprisingly creamy it is for a 20-year piece of Cheddar, and how the calcium lactate crystals crunch in your mouth like pop rocks. And guess what? All of these things are true.

What you’re likely to hear less about, is that tonight, Tony and Julie Hook donated $40,000 – half of all proceeds from their 20-year cheddar — to the new Babcock Hall/Center for Dairy Research Building Fund at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

“I said when we started this, that if I got a cheddar to make it to 20 years, I’d donate half the money to the Center for Dairy Research,” Tony said. “Well, I meant it. We’re proud of the work they’re doing and looking forward to a new facility.”

Ground is expected to be broken this summer on the new Babcock Hall, which will be a state-of-the-art facility at UW-Madison with 20,000 square feet dedicated to a new Center for Dairy Research and dairy processing space with specialty ripening rooms to manufacture and experiment with mold and surface ripened cheeses. The building is expected to be finished in 2018.

Many, many thanks to the Hook’s team for making such an amazing cheese and for their generosity to the the industry. And a big thank you to chefs Tory Miller, Justin Aprahamian and Justin Carlisle for a fabulous dinner with seven courses featuring Hook’s Cheddar from young to old.

First off, all three chefs each created a cheese curd dish: top right with Kimchi by Miller, bottom with pesto and pickled rhubarb by Aprahamian, and left with truffles, Buddha’s hand and koshu from Carlisle.

Next, Miller created a 2-year Hook’s Cheddar “nacho” with chorizo, picled jalapeno and cilantro.

The first official course (the previous were bonus starter courses) was charred asparagus, rhubarb-hickory nut salumera and shaved 5-year Hook’s Cheddar from Miller.

Second course was one of my top 10 favorite dishes ever: Hook’s 10-Year Cheddar soup, with pepper, beer vinegar, popcorn wafers and chives by Carlisle.

Third course: 15-year Hook’s Cheddar with roasted veal breast, apricot and turnip by Aprahamian. One of our table mates had to stop mid-chew because he was “having a moment” and never wanted this dish to end.

Cheese course: Hook’s 20-year Cheddar. The dining room applauded after the first taste (and Wisconsin Foodie recorded our reactions).

Dessert: curd cheesecake with rhubarb, meringue, basil and delicious mystery pink ice by Carlisle.

Many, many thanks to all three chefs, L’Etoile, the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board and the Hook’s Cheese team for making tonight’s dinner happen. Wisconsin salutes you!

cheeseunderground dairy farm, john pagel, ponderosa dairy, ponderosa farm, Wisconsin cheese

Pagel’s Ponderosa Dairy: More Cows, More Milk, New Cheese

Wisconsin media reported last week that while the number of Wisconsin dairy cow farms dropped below 10,000 for the first time in generations, both cow’s milk production and specialty cheese numbers in America’s Dairyland are up. How can that be?

With the high cost of land and feed, farms today must get bigger to stay profitable and compete on a national level. It is no longer viable for the average farmer to milk 10 cows and still make enough money to take a vacation or send kids to college. That’s why we’re seeing more family farms combine herds, add cows and grow larger.

Here’s a breakdown of farm and cow numbers in Wisconsin, according to the last agricultural census: about 1,300 farms milk 19 cows or less; 3,200 milk 20-49 cows; about 4,200 operations milk 40-99 cows; 1,580 farms milk 100-199 cows; 815 farms milk 200-499 cows; 256 operations milk 500-999 cows; 106 farms milk 1,000 to 2,499 cows; and 25 dairies milk more than 2,500 cows.

Despite the overall lower number of farms, Wisconsin dairies are producing more milk. In fact, the state’s 1.27 million cows produced a record 27.7 billion pounds of milk last year, a record high.

Speaking of records, the Wisconsin Agricultural Statistics Service released the latest Specialty Cheese numbers this week. In 2014, Wisconsin maintained its ranking as the nation’s no. 1 cheese producing state, with specialty cheese accounting for 23 percent of all cheese production,  up from 15 percent in 2006.

Of the state’s 127 cheese plants, 91 craft at least one type of specialty cheese. Feta accounts for the largest share of specialty cheese production, with Blue, Havarti, Hispanic types, specialty Mozzarella, Parmesan and specialty Provolone all remaining popular. Italian Fontina production rose a record 27 percent over the previous year, while Romano wheel production was 20 percent higher.

And while the number of cheese plants in Wisconsin continues to increase, one Wisconsin dairy family announced this week it plans to expand that number even further. John Pagel, owner of Pagel’s Ponderosa Dairy in Kewaunee, announced construction is underway for a 2,500-square-foot cheese plant on the family farm.

The Pagels milk 5,000 cows and have been experimenting with cheesemaking since last summer, having a nearby cheese plant craft cheese with their milk. During a Wisconsin Specialty Cheese Institute meeting in September on the Pagel farm, attendees were treated to a prototype Ponderosa Dairy cheese of garlic and herb cheddar. John says he’s been working with the Center for Dairy Research in Madison to develop a unique farmstead cheese that will carry the Pagel’s Ponderosa Dairy Farm label, and on May 1, hired Master Cheesemaker Steve Hurd as farm cheese plant manager.

The Pagels already see between 10,000 to 12,000 visitors on their farm every year, John says, so building an on-farm cheese plant is the natural next step. “I’ve got four kids working on the farm now, and 10 grandkids eager to get into the business.”

Expanding his farm over time has been key to the Pagels’ success. John took over the family farm from his father in 1980, milking 150 cows. In 1995, the farm expanded to 450 cows, and in 2000, the farm built a double-20 parlor, expanding to 1,500 cows. In 2008, the Pagels built an on-farm methane digester that creates enough energy to power 1,200 homes, and in 2009, installed a 72-cow rotary milking parlor that milks 525 cows an hour. The herd is primarily Jersey-cross breed and Holsteins.

The 72-cow rotary milking parlor at Pagel’s Ponderosa Dairy.

Last year, John purchased Ron’s Cheese in Luxemburg, Wisconsin, and signed a lease to launch the Cannery Public Market in downtown Green Bay, a proposed local foods center. He plans to use Ron’s Cheese as both a retail outlet and wholesale distributor, and to sell the farm’s cheese at the new Green Bay facility, next door to Titletown Brewery. Prototypes of Ponderosa Cheese made and aged at a nearby cheese plant is now for sale online.

“We’re hoping to create an atmosphere that consumers will enjoy and supply it with our own beef, cheese and dairy products,” John says. He’s working to create a one-stop destination at the farm where visitors can see cows milked, energy created and cheese manufactured. “People will be able to watch a number of technologies happen all in the same location.”

Congratulations to the Pagel family! We look forward to eating more of your cheese very soon.

cheeseunderground dog, Wisconsin

The Year of the Beagle

Bagel the Wonder Beagle

The Chinese may still be arguing over whether it is the Year of the Goat or the Year of the Sheep, but at my house, there is no doubt: 2015 is the Year of the Beagle.

About a year ago, our 18-year-old daughter adopted a 9-year-old Beagle from an animal rescue. Gunner, as he was known then, was turned over to the shelter by his original owner, who had raised him from a puppy. A three-page hand-written letter came with the dog, detailing favorite foods, toys, likes, dislikes and a complete medical history. However, the last question was the most telling. It asked: “Reason for giving up animal.” The answer simply said: “Wife.”

So Gunner came to live with our daughter and was renamed Bagel the Wonder Beagle. The name was in honor of a former exchange student we had hosted from Thailand, who often confused the words bagel and beagle, as in: “I’d like a beagle for breakfast.” My daughter decided then and there that if she ever got a dog, it would be a Beagle and his name would be Bagel. I added the Wonder Beagle.

Fast forward to two months ago, when our daughter and Bagel the Wonder Beagle came home to live with us. The 18-year-old discovered the real world was expensive and begrudgingly came home to roost. Of course, the dog came along, too. We were rather less than thrilled. After all, we are cat people. We have always had cats and currently are parents to three: Louie, Sammy and Sylvester. With Bagel and Lionel Richie, our daughter’s rescue cat, we were now home to four cats and a dog. Yes, we are actually outnumbered by pets, none of whom of course get along. Our house is literally a five-ring circus.

Soon after she moved back home, it became apparent that with our daughter’s work schedule, Bagel was not getting outside often enough. After a few days of coming home to find pee puddles and poop piles in my living room, I begrudgingly took over the dog walking schedule to save my house from ruin. Let me clear, I was not happy about this. I am a cat person.

At first, I thought walking Bagel might give me some exercise. As a cheesemonger, I am on my feet 8 hours a day, but let’s face it, that isn’t really exercise. It’s standing, squatting, bending, reaching and lifting. I figured that walking a dog would be a nice change of pace.

Turns out that walking a Beagle doesn’t really involve much walking. It’s mostly starting, stopping, and standing while your Beagle sniffs the trail of a squirrel that crossed the lawn eight months ago. Walking a Beagle is a lot like watching paint dry. You stand in the same spot for a long time, walk five steps, then stand in that spot for a long time. And then you repeat that for as long as you are willing to “walk” the Beagle.

After about a week of becoming frustrated with the non-walking of walking the dog, I started to notice stuff. Like, the next door neighbors have a fire pit in their backyard. The neighbors two houses down have a banner that says “Congratulations Zach” hanging in their living room. I’ve lived down the street from these folks for 12 years and I don’t know who Zach is. The neighbors across the street have three boys – this I knew because I’ve seen them waiting for the bus – but they also have a dog named Buddy who is a cross between a Beagle and something else (they can’t remember). I didn’t even know they had a dog.

Walking down the street further, I learned the house five houses away has a waterfall in their backyard. I know this because I can hear it when Bagel is sniffing their garden hose for a solid three minutes and I have nothing to do but stand there and listen. I learned there are a lot of trees on our street. We’ve got ash, maple, oak, poplar, a whole bunch of blossoming bushes and an entire family of pines just in a one-block radius. I know this because I’ve stood and studied them in depth while Bagel has sniffed a dandelion for four minutes.

Walking Bagel around our block takes a solid 35 minutes. The first half block is a breeze – usually, Bagel almost runs until you turn right. He’s not thrilled about that first turn, but he does it without putting up a fuss. The second right turn is more of a struggle. He wants to go straight, left, up, down, anywhere but right, because he knows that is one more turn closer to home. But eventually he turns, and is pretty happy along the way. Between the second and third turn, I’ve gotten to know neighbors who live one street away from me that I never knew existed. I know the names of their dogs, the names of their kids, and how often they weed their lawn.

The third right turn is when we start to hit a roadblock. Bagel does not like the third turn. By the fourth and final turn toward home, we have a serious slowdown. Walking the half block back to the house literally takes as much time as the entire walk before the final turn. Bagel has been known to actually lay down in protest in the lawn at the fourth turn. In good news, the neighbor that lives on that corner is also my plumber, so we often talk shop while Bagel the Wonder Beagle lays with his head on the ground,  his big sad puppy eyes looking up as if to say: “Just one more time around the block?”

Just another day in paradise.

Once we get home, Bagel is always back to his happy self, ready to eat, drink and nap. He particularly enjoys laying next to my husband on the couch. Sylvester our cat usually perches on his lap, and Bagel the Wonder Beagle lays on the side. I’m usually in charge of separating the other fighting cats.

Having Bagel in our house, even for what will likely be for a short time, has given me a new appreciation of dogs. I can understand why people enjoy coming home to an animal who is actually happy to see them, rather than three cats who meow in protest that no one has been home to feed them for eight hours.

Walking Bagel has also given me new insights into a neighborhood in which I’ve lived 12 years. When you’re walking a Beagle, people stop what they’re doing to say hello. When you’re walking a Beagle, people cross the street to pet your dog and chat. When you’re walking a Beagle, you notice things you’re normally too busy to see. During the course of the past two months, I’ve met more people in my neighborhood than I have in the past 12 years. Turns out Bagel the Wonder Beagle was just what I needed.

cheeseunderground cheese, Colby, deer creek, The artisan cheese exchange, The Robin, Wisconsin cheese

Colby Makes A Comeback with The Robin

In 2009, Jon Topp of Chesterfield, Missouri, sent me an email and attached a spreadsheet listing dozens of Colby cheeses he had ordered from Midwestern cheesemakers during the past several years, in a quest to find the Colby of his youth. Growing up in the 1960s in central Iowa near a small country store that carried the “absolute best Colby cheese,” Jon remembered eating Colby in longhorns, wrapped in cloth and wax.

He said he could remember the taste like it was yesterday: mild, deliciously nutty, firm and laced with small holes. Most importantly, like much of the Colby made today, it was NOT mild cheddar. It was dry, not rubbery, gooey or wet and had the perfect salt to moisture ratio.

In short, it was perfect. And Jon Topp could no longer find it. Since then, I, too have been on a quest to find true, original Colbys (and found them at Hook’s Cheese and Widmer’s Cheese Cellars). This week, fellow cheese peeps, I found another one.

Introducing Deer Creek The Robin, named for Wisconsin’s state bird, this Colby is a partnership between Henning’s Cheese in Kiel and Chris Gentine of The Artisan Cheese Exchange in Sheboygan. Turns out Chris, too, has been on a quest to find true Colby, so he worked with the Colby masters at Henning’s to create a young cheese with a firm, open and curdy body. It is not made in longhorns (good luck finding many cheesemakers who want to hand-punch curd into a longhorn form anymore), but it is made in12-pound tall wheels, bandaged with linen and dipped in wax.

The result could very well be the end of Jon Topp’s journey: a true Colby of years gone by, with a fresh, dairy flavor, buttery, yet curdy texture with nutty notes and nice salty finish.

If you’re wondering why this is such a big deal (I know what you’re thinking – I can buy Colby in any supermarket store in America), let me give you a brief background on this iconic cheese. Colby was invented in Wisconsin by Joseph F. Steinwand in 1885. He named it for the township in which his father, Ambrose Steinwand, Sr., had built northern Clark County’s first cheese factory three years before.

The Code of Federal Regulations – as specified in Sec. 133.118, describes the requirements for making Colby cheese. The key difference between cheddar and traditional Colby is that during the make process, the curd mass is cut, stirred, and heated with continued stirring, to separate the whey and curd. Then, part of the whey is drained off, and the curd is cooled by adding water, with continued stirring, which is different from cheddar (no added water/rinse with cheddar). The Colby curd is then completely drained, salted, stirred, further drained, and pressed into forms, instead of being allowed to knit together like Cheddar.

Back in 2010, after Jon Tropp initially emailed me, I contacted cheese industry guru John Jaeggi at the Center for Dairy Research in Madison, and he told me this traditional make method allowed Colby a curdy texture with mechanical openings. The flavor was slightly sweet with a slight salty note. Best of all, John said, the cheese had a dairy, milky note.

All this was grand until 1998, when the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture changed the state standard of identity for Colby cheese — here is a link to the original document with the original wording – you’ll have to scroll down to 81.50(2) and note the the hand-written notation with the change in statute — and amended ATCP 81.50(2) by adding this little gem of a sentence:

“Wisconsin certified premium grade AA colby and monterey (jack) cheese shall be reasonably firm. The cheese may have evenly distributed small mechanical openings or a closed body.”

This annotation, especially the portion I’ve highlighted in red, led to significant changes in the make process of Colby by Wisconsin manufacturers. Because mechanical openings were no longer required of Colby, many processors today simply (and I’m going to get in trouble for saying this, but it is the truth) make a cheese that resembles mild cheddar but label it as Colby.

But it’s not just the change in state statutes that doomed Colby in Wisconsin. Jaeggi notes technology improvements have also changed Colby. “I think cultures are faster. Older cultures were slower single strains, resulting in slower make times. These slower cultures tended to make for a sweeter cheese,” Jaeggi says. Another change is the curd wash, he says. Many large manufacturers now do a curd rinse (no hold) after dropping the curd pH down to a 5.60. Old time Colby makers used to drain whey to the curd line while the curd was still sweet – at 6.00 pH or higher. Then after the whey was drained to the curd line, water was added to drop the curd temperature to a set target. After 15 minutes, the whey/water was drained off the curd and then the curd was salted. Most of the acid developed in the press. The reason this changed was larger plants understandably did not want to process all that water along with the whey.

Lastly, the hoop sizes and pressing of the cheeses is much different today than it was back in the day. Traditional Colby was made in the longhorn shape and pressed in 13 pound horns. They were then waxed for sale. Other plants made Colby in 40 pound blocks.

Which gets me back to Deer Creek The Robin. This Colby is a true anomaly – it is crafted in a 12-pound wheel, but has the taste, flavor and texture of longhorn Colby cheeses of years gone by. I got a chance to taste the cheese this week when Gentine shipped me a wheel at Metcalfe’s Market-Hilldale in Madison. We cut open the wheel, and then stood in awe, as we smelled the old-time milkiness of true Colby and could literally count the openings in the curd like stars in the sky.

Deer Creek The Robin is just now making its debut in national markets, and I am excited that Metcalfe’s Market-Hilldale is one of the first stores to carry it. We have it proudly displayed on our Deer Creek shelf, sandwiched between Deer Creek The Stag and Deer Creek The Fawn, two Grade AA Cheddars Gentine has also created with the help of Henning’s Cheese.

So, Mr. Topp – wherever you may be – while you may never find the Colby you grew up with (Jaeggi says most traditional Colby was made by small cheesemakers, each factory had their own unique flavor profile, and sadly, most, if not all, of those factories are now closed) — you may want to try Deer Creek The Robin. It may very well be a close second to the the Colby of your childhood.

cheeseunderground beginning cheesemaker, eckerman, scholarship, Wisconsin cheese, wisconsin cheese originals

Your Next Future Wisconsin Cheesemaker: Christopher Eckerman

A University of Wisconsin-Madison student aiming to develop his own brand of sheep milk cheeses is the recipient of the 2015 Beginning Cheesemaker Scholarship from Wisconsin Cheese Originals.

A committee of industry leaders selected Christopher Eckerman, Antigo, for the $2,500 annual award. As you know, Wisconsin is the only state to require cheesemakers to be licensed, an 18-month process that involves attendance at five university short courses, 240 hours of apprenticeship under a licensed cheesemaker, and passing a written exam at the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture.

Eckerman is a full-time student at UW-Madison majoring in Food Science. He grew up on a sheep farm of 200 milking ewes in Antigo. He is a member of the Dairy Product Evaluation Team on campus, and hopes to apprentice this summer in the Babcock Dairy Plant under Master Cheesemaker Gary Grossen. His long-term goal is to continue the family farm and craft his own brand of seasonal sheep milk cheeses.

This marks the sixth year Wisconsin Cheese Originals has offered a $2,500 scholarship to a beginning cheesemaker. Past recipients include:

•    2014: Sandra Acosta, dairy goat farmer in Port Washington, Wis. She is continuing to work toward obtaining her cheesemaker’s license.
•    2013: Jennifer Digman, licensed cheesemaker and dairy farmer in Cuba City, Wis.
•    2012: Anna Landmark, licensed cheesemaker and owner of Landmark Creamery. She won a gold medal at the 2015 U.S. Championship Cheese Contest for Petit Nuage, a fresh sheep’s milk cheese.
•    2011: Rose Boero, licensed cheesemaker and dairy goat farmer in Custer, Wis.
•    2010: Katie Furhmann, licensed cheesemaker at LaClare Farms in Pipe, Wis. At the 2011 U.S. Championship Cheese Contest, she took Best in Show for her goat’s milk cheese, Evalon, and was named U.S. Champion.

Congrats to Christopher – we can’t wait to watch you grow in this industry!

cheeseunderground cheese, dairy, gouda, hollands family farm, marieke gouda, marieke penterman, rolf penterman, Wisconsin cheese

Marieke Penterman: One Rockin’ Mama Cheesemaker

There is no doubt that U.S. Champion Cheesemaker Marieke Penterman is absolutely a good cheesemaker. She’s got the credentials, awards and aging room full of cheese to prove it. And there’s no doubt the girl can dance – anyone who’s ever witnessed her moves when winning an award can attest to her prowess on a stage. But above all, and perhaps not as well known, is the fact that Marieke Penterman is an amazing mom and wife. All it takes is a visit to her family’s new retail store, cheese plant, dairy barn and milking parlor off Highway 29 in Thorp to confirm that Marieke is indeed a master at balancing work and family.

Walking up to the brand new Holland’s Family Cheese agri-tourism facility – where visitors can see every step of cheesemaking from farm to fork – is seeing every dream of a first-generation immigrant family come true. After winning the 2013 U.S. Championship Cheese Contest, Marieke, her husband, Rolf, and their five children, aged 11 to 5, put their plans of building a visitor-friendly dairy facility in high gear.

Today, from 7 am to 7 pm, visitors start in the Holland’s Family dairy barn, where they can watch 435 cows milked three times a day. Two sets of viewing windows – downstairs and upstairs – make for great viewing perspectives of how the Pentermans’ herd of Holsteins, Red Holsteins, Brown Swiss and crossbred cows are milked in a modern parlor. School groups can visit with teachers for just $2 per child, and  gather in an upstairs educational room to hear the details of milking cows, followed by cheese tasting. Self-guided tours for the public are free, and guided tours may be booked in advance for a fee.

From the dairy barn, visitors walk just a few yards past a giant fiberglass Holstein cow to enter the retail store and cheese plant, which features large viewing windows of both the cheesemaking room and the aging rooms. A cozy fireplace with comfortable couches invites guests to get a cup of complimentary coffee, buy a wedge of cheese, and enjoy it right on site. An ice cream counter filled with Kelley’s Country Creamery is perfect for kids, and shelves of authentic Dutch foods and goodies are available for purchase. Marieke also believes in supporting her fellow Wisconsin cheesemakers, so a huge cooler filled with Wisconsin specialty and artisan cheeses round out the shopping experience.

But it’s not until one sees the parts of the facility not open to the public that one begins to learn what a a devoted mother Marieke is to her five kids: twin girls Luna & Joyce, age 11; Dean, 8; Fenne, 7; and Finn, 5. After school, the kids march up to the offices of the cheese plant to do their homework, where each has a self-decorated workstation with their initial on it, and where, three days a week, a high school student helps them with homework.

Marieke says she also helps them with schoolwork when she can, but like most parents – including me – by the time your kids are in middle school, math problems and grammar exercises are beyond us. With her office right across the hallway – marked by a bright orange door (each of the employees got to pick the colors of their doors and office walls), Marieke can both make sales calls while watching her kids out the door.

Unlike the original Penterman farmstead just a few miles away – where the farm house was across the yard from the dairy barn and cheese factory, the Pentermans purposely built their new house away from the farm – close enough to see it, but not close enough to walk there. “I liked being right on the farm before, but now, with a store open 7 am to 7 pm, we are here a lot. And I want my kids to know that when we’re home, it means we’re home. That’s for the family.”

The Penterman kids also remember where they came from. Marieke and Rolf speak both Dutch and English to their children (on a visit this weekend, each child was asked in Dutch to introduce themselves, and each did so with incredible cuteness), and Marieke proudly displays pictures of both her and Rolf’s family on the upstairs walls above the retail area. This area is available to the public to rent out for parties – “Our first party was a bachelorette party, and we didn’t even have it done yet,” says Marieke. Especially poignant photos include this one of Marieke’s grandmother and father, who as a small boy, is watching his mother milk the family cow:

And then there’s this one, taken many years later, which show Marieke as a little girl, holding the lead rope of one of her father’s Holsteins.

It’s hard to believe that not yet 10 years ago, Marieke started her cheesemaking journey with just one helper in the cheese room. Today, the Holland’s Family crew is made up of 20 women and 4 men, a strong and growing team, including Natalie, the sister of one of the original cheesemakers Marieke hired when she first started. That’s Natalie pictured at left below, with Marieke in the middle.

When she’s not in the cheese room or her office, or attempting to help the kids with homework, Marieke still finds time to be in the barn. She knows many of the cows by name, and even talked a local veterinarian into setting the broken leg of a recently-born calf. The vet, of course, wrote “Gouda Luck”, and all the kids signed it.

But it turns out Marieke isn’t the only devoted parent with a sense of fun – on a visit to Holland’s Family Cheese this weekend, we watched as Marieke’s husband, Rolf put air in the giant “Kangaroo Pad” right outside the front door of the retail store. The pad is open to all visitors – no matter their age – to jump on and have a little fun.

On this day, the first kids to break it in for the season were the Penterman brood. Twins Luna and Joyce jumped with abandon, while Dean chased his sisters, Fenne took frequent breaks to eat Laffy Taffy gathered at that morning’s Thorp Easter Egg Hunt, and little Finn tried valiantly not to slide off the edge when his brothers and sisters jumped near him.

And to top it all off – Rolf joined in on the fun, jumping from end to end right along with the kids, stepping off at the end, out of breath, to give Marieke a hug and to encourage her to give it a try. She smiled and joked she was happy to watch him and the kids. Because as a champion cheesemaker, mother and wife, she needed to hurry back inside the store to wait on a customer who was eagerly waiting to buy a wedge of cheese with her name on it.

cheeseunderground cheese, willy st. coop, Wisconsin cheese

2015 Willy Street Co-op Cheese Challenge: Cast Your Vote!

Never mind that the U.S. Cheese Championships are happening today in Milwaukee, or that UW-Madison’s own Big 10 basketball player of the year Frank Kaminsky is on the cover of Sports Illustrated, or that spring has sprung in Wisconsin, the real news today revolves around the “Cheese Taste Testing Challenge” dreamt up by the geniuses at Willy Street Co-op in Madison.
Behold the ultimate Wisconsin specialty cheese bracket:
Inspired by the NCAA basketball tournament, the 2015 Co-op Cheese Challenge sets 32 Wisconsin cheeses against one another to determine the state’s big cheese. In even more exciting news, several cheeses will be sampled at both Co-op locations from 9 am to 1 pm on:
  • Today, March 19 through Sunday March 22 – Round 1
  • Thursday, March 26 and Friday, March 27 – Squeaky 16
  • Saturday, March 28 and Sunday, March 29 – Edible 8
  • Thursday, April 2 and Friday, April 3  – Fromage Final 4
  • Saturday April 4 and Sunday, April 5 – Cheese Championship
Throughout the Cheese Challenge we cheese geeks can vote via Facebook on which cheeses we like best to see who advances to the next round. You can also vote in-store at both Willy St. locations.
May the best cheese win!
cheeseunderground alemar cheese, ameribella, hooigan, jasper hill, kinsman ridge, st. jenifer cheese, stinky cheese, vermont cheese

American Stinkies in the Spotlight

American cheesemakers are finally beginning to rival the great
stinky cheeses of Europe.

More American cheesemakers than ever before are perfecting the art of crafting stinky cheese. Once a category limited to just smell-my-feet Limburger and German-style smear-ripened Brick, American stinkies are arcing into the realm of the greats: Taleggio, Reblochon, Alsatian Munster. This category of cheese, similar to strong coffee, hoppy beer or aged Scotch, can be an acquired taste. But once you get a taste for this kind of cheese, you’ll drive miles to find a good one.

Here are five of my American favorites:

1. Good Thunder, Alemar Cheese, Mankato, Minnesota. This miniature square of stinky comes from southern Minnesota, which much like my hometown in southwestern Wisconsin, is more famous for its potluck hot dish and rhubarb recipes than French-inspired, smear-ripened mountain cheese. But cheesemaker Craig Hageman hits nothing but net with Good Thunder. Bathed in Minnesota’s own Surly Brewing Bender beer (an American Oatmeal Brown Ale), the cheese sports a  pumpkin-hued rind with a velvety, buttery, savory paste with just-right notes of meaty and mushroom.

2. St. Jenifer, Creme de la Coulee Artisan Cheese, Madison, Wisconsin. I’ve got to give Cheesemaker Bill Anderson credit: the dude is aspiring to make the kinds of cheese most Wisconsin cheesemakers walk away from in favor of a safe, orange cheddar. St. Jenifer is named for Jenifer Brozak, affineur at Bear Valley Affinage, a custom cheese aging facility turning out some of the state’s best cheeses. A young, gypsy cheesemaker with no facility of his own, Bill makes his cheeses at Willow Creek Cheese in Berlin. My favorite wheels of St. Jenifer are on the younger side, with a slightly firmer paste and less bitter finish.

3. Kinsman Ridge, made by Landaff Creamery and matured by Cellars at Jasper Hill, Vermont. Helder dos Santos at CE Zuercher & Company, a distributor out of Chicago, first sent me a sample of this cheese about a year ago. Inspired by French tommes, such as St. Nectaire, Kinsman Ridge is as close you’re going to get to a raw-milk French mountain cheese without going to France. Aged three to five months, this stinky beauty is a bit firmer than most others on this list, but the taste is consistently stellar. If you can find this cheese in the Midwest, snatch up every last piece, throw a party, and share the gospel of good cheese with your best friends.

4. Ameribella, Jacobs & Brichford, Connersville, Indiana. This is the kind of semi-soft, washed rind stinky you can smell three feet away. Oh yeah, baby. Inspired by the cheeses of northern Italy, its salty, savory flavor is perfectly matched with a smooth, stretchy texture that resembles Rush Creek Reserve in rectangular form. It just won a 2015 Good Food Award, and with good reason. One of the newest stinkies on the American market, it’s just beginning to achieve national distribution.

5. Hooligan, Cato Corner Farm, Colchester Connecticut. An oldie but a goodie – this one’s been around since 2006, but it’s hard to find in the Midwest because many of our white bread cousins are still cutting their teeth on food with flavor. I first tasted this cheese several years ago at the American Cheese Society’s annual Festival of Cheese, and essentially stood guard next to its table and ate half the platter over the course of an evening. (Don’t ask how that turned out). It’s been selected by both Saveur magazine and Slow Food USA as one of the top American cheeses made today. Another raw-milk cheese, Hooligan is aged more than 60 days to achieve that tell-tale pumpkin orange washed-rind outside color and inside buttery, creamy, savory flavor. It’s pretty much perfection on a plate.

cheeseunderground agri-service, cheese, goat's milk, peter dixon, sheep's milk cheese

On Location: In Pennsylvania Studying Cheese & Eating Whoopie Pies

Well, it’s official, I love Pennsylvania. Not only does this fabulous state host one of the best cheesemaker conferences I’ve ever attended, it also makes a whoopie pie that will literally be the best thing you’ve ever eaten in three bites.

Maybe I’m still riding the sugary high of this hand-made bad boy from the Rotelle family at September Farm Cheese in Honey Brook, PA:

or perhaps it’s the cheese induced coma I’ve been in the past two days, but I’m telling you, the little burg of New Holland, Pennsylvania – birthplace of New Holland Equipment, home to my favorite hay rake growing up on the family farm (yes, I already emailed my dad a picture of the big downtown headquarters sign) – is one happening artisan cheese mecca. This is what I discovered, thanks to the fine folks who invited me to speak at the 2015 Cheese Makers’ Resource Conference, sponsored by the uber-organized Agri-Service LLC team.

More than 170 cheesemakers and dairy folk from around the country coming from as far away as Washington, Oregon, Arizona and Connecticut, descended on New Holland this week to attend the annual conference, featuring in-depth educational sessions on Cheddar cheesemaking, sheep & goat cheeses, regulatory challenges, cultured dairy products, creamery start-ups, and panel discussions on breaking into markets with new products.

My job was to lead two different tasting and sensory sessions on salt, sour and bitter notes in cheese (there’s nothing I’d rather do than talk cheese!), but by far, the highlight of the conference for me were three back-to-back sessions with veteran artisan cheesemaker and consultant Peter Dixon, who talked a rapt room through the art and science of making goat and sheep milk cheeses.

Taking notes as fast as humanly possible, I learned a whole lot of new information on how goat and sheep milk is different for cheesemaking, and how milk composition of these species varies greatly depending on the animals’ lactation calendar. As we all know, a female animal must give birth in order to start giving milk (lactating). The average length of lactating for sheep is 220-240 days, and for goats, 305 days, before the ladies “dry up” in time to give birth again a few months later.

Milk produced during the length of a ewe or doe’s (or cow’s for that matter) milking season varies greatly in composition. For example, the ratio of protein to fat in the last 30 to 60 days of a sheep or goat’s milking cycle is greatly decreased. In other words, the percentage of milkfat is higher, and the percentage of protein in that milk is much lower. Cheese yield goes up, but the quality of that cheese may go down, and be much higher in moisture.

That’s why it can be hard to make a good quality hard, aged cheese from late lactation milk in all species, Dixon says. The key is to make different types of cheese depending on the type of milk produced during the lactation cycle. European cheesemakers had this figured out hundreds of years ago in the Alps. They knew that after giving birth in the spring, the height of the cow’s lacation cycle was in the summer, when the cows would be on Alpine pastures, producing milk rich in both fat and protein and perfect for making huge, round Alpine cheese such as Emmentaler and Gruyere. In winter time – at the end of the cows’ milking calendar – cheesemakers invented tommes, smaller cheeses that didn’t need to age as long, and were often considered inferior in quality to the big wheel cheeses of summer.

Since we don’t live in the Alps, a modern American solution as to what to do with late lactation sheep’s milk, Dixon says, is to blend it with cow’s or goat’s milk to still get a solid quality ratio of fat to protein, and to have enough milk to make a vat of cheese (animals will start drying up at the end of the lactation schedule, resulting in less and less milk in the waning days of the season). Dixon’s general rule of thumb? Any cow’s mixed milk cheese must contain at least 20 percent of goat or sheep milk to obtain any flavor profile of the sheep or goat.

In addition, goat and cow’s milk may also be blended with sheep’s milk to make softer cheeses, or, late lactation sheep milk may be frozen and mixed with the next year’s milk to make a fresh batch of cheese.

“The key is: don’t make the same cheese thinking you have the same milk every day,” Dixon says. “Different milk equals different cheeses depending on the time of the year.”

While this year’s conference focused on cheddar and goat and sheep cheeses, next year’s conference will focus on soft-ripened cheeses, with keynote speaker Gianaclis Caldwell already booked for the February 9-10 event, said Dale Martin, president of Agri-Service. I’d highly recommend attending the conference, and then making a short road trip to September Farm Cheese to not only eat their line-up flavored cheddars and jacks, but to also consume the best Whoopie Pie of your life. Best. Day. Ever.

September Farm Cheese in Honey Brook, PA, home to the best Whoopie
Pie ever. Yes, ever.
cheeseunderground cheese, cheesetopia, Wisconsin cheese, wisconsin cheese originals

CheeseTopia Debuts in Milwaukee April 12 – Tickets on Sale Soon!

Exciting news, cheese peeps. Today I announced that CheeseTopia, a new one-day traveling festival that aims to bring the best of the Midwest’s farmstead and artisan cheeses to the heart of the city, officially debuts in Milwaukee on April 12.

Tickets are $25 and go on sale to the public on Feb. 24 at 10 a.m. Members of Wisconsin Cheese Originals may purchase tickets one week earlier. All tickets will be sold in advance.

The event will take place inside the Pritzlaff Building, a renovated warehouse in the Historic Third Ward of Milwaukee. More than 20,000 square feet of floor space will be filled with cheesemaker and artisan food tables surrounded by carved wooden beams, industrial age columns, Victorian era arched windows and gritty cream city brick. Year two of the festival will be in Chicago, while year three is set to take place in Minneapolis.

The goal of CheeseTopia is to bring the best of Midwest artisan and farmstead cheese to the heart of major cities by offering attendees the opportunity to sample and purchase cheese from 40 cheesemakers and local artisans from the Great Lakes Region, including Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois and Iowa. The festival will be open from Noon to 4 p.m.  and offer a fun open marketplace atmosphere with cheese samples and a cash bar.

Here’s a list of participating cheesemakers, with more likely to be added in the next week or two:

  • Alemar Cheese Company, Mankato, MN
  • Burnett Dairy Cooperative, Grantsburg, WI
  • Capri Cheese, Blue River, WI
  • Caprine Supreme, Black River, WI
  • Carr Valley Cheese, LaValle, WI
  • Clock Shadow Creamery, Milwaukee, WI
  • Crave Brothers Farmstead Cheese, Waterloo, WI
  • Crème de la Coulee Artisan Cheese, Madison, WI
  • Emmi Roth USA, Monroe, WI
  • Harmony Specialty Dairy Foods, Stratford, WI
  • Hidden Springs Creamery, Westby, WI
  • Holland’s Family Cheese, Thorp, WI
  • Klondike Cheese, Monroe, WI
  • Koepke Family Farms, Oconomowoc, WI
  • LaClare Farms Specialties, Malone, WI
  • Landmark Creamery, Albany, WI
  • Ludwig Farmstead Creamery, Fifthian, IL
  • Maple Leaf Cheese, Monroe, WI
  • Marcoot Jersery Creamery, Greenville, IL
  • Martha’s Pimento Cheese, Milwaukee, WI
  • Montchevre-Betin Inc, Belmont, WI
  • PastureLand, Belleville, WI
  • Prairie Fruits Farm, Champaign, IL
  • Roelli Cheese, Shullsburg, WI
  • Sartori Company, Plymouth, WI
  • Saxon Creamery, Cleveland, WI
  • Springside Cheese Corp, Oconto Falls, WI
  • Tea-Rose Toggenburgs, Custer, WI
  • The Artisan Cheese Exchange, Sheboygan, WI
  • Treat Bakehouse, Milwaukee, WI
  • Uplands Cheese, Dodgeville, WI

While many of these artisans will sell their products, farmer’s market style, those who don’t have the opportunity to make cheese available for purchase from Larry’s Market. Owners Steve Ehlers and Patty Peterson will set up tables of cheeses for sale at CheeseTopia, bringing a slice of their Brown Deer market to the heart of the city. Thank you, Larry’s Market!

In addition, breakout seminars will take place in separate meeting spaces inside the Pritzlaff Building, which was constructed in 1875 and just recently renovated. Seminar topics will be announced next week. Stay tuned!