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After four years of due diligence and market research that included visiting hundreds of dairy plants and retail operations, Karen Kelley and her family celebrated the grand opening of their farmstead ice cream factory this past weekend. Located just a mile off Hwy 41 south of Fond du Lac, Kelley Country Creamery is an ice cream oasis in the middle of dairy country.

The Kelleys craft 61 different flavors of ice cream – everything from Bleu Cheese Pear to Maple Bacon to old-fashioned Whitewash Vanilla. Customers pull up to a rustic-looking retail store, order their ice cream (I’d recommend adding a home-made waffle cone), and eat it while sitting in one of the many rocking chairs on the front porch, or inside an air-conditioned lobby.

The Kelley’s ice cream tastes different (and I would argue better) than most ice creams you’ve ever had, because 1) it starts with farm-fresh, non-homogenized milk from the Kelley herd of 65 Holsteins, 2) is created into a mix at the local Lamer’s Dairy, and 3) is then combined with top quality local ingredients to create a premium ice cream that truly tastes homemade.

In fact, if you’ve ever made homemade ice cream, you’ll recognize the taste right away. Milky, creamy, just pure dairy – I tried eight different flavors on Saturday and never discovered a kind I didn’t like. It reminds me of the ice cream we used to make in elementary school – when our teacher would bring in her own little ice cream maker, and we’d combine all the ingredients, mix it vigorously and have home-made ice cream for an afternoon treat.

About 1,500 people turned out for the grand opening on Saturday, enjoying ice cream, free t-shirt give-aways, a kids tent with activities and various games, all with the backdrop of the Kelley’s serene herd of dairy cows grazing in the background.

The day started with a noon ceremony, in which Jim Gage of the Dairy Business Innovation Center presented Karen and Tim Kelley with a letter of congratulations from Ag Secretary Rod Nilsestuen and a plaque from Governor Jim Doyle.

Karen then introduced her entire family, all smartly outfitted with Kelley green shirts. Kids Amy, Betsy, Heidi, Molly and Clark all seem to have a hand in the business, with Betsy even quitting her full-time marketing job at Miller-Coors to come home and help mom run the family business.

The highlight of the day had to be the “Wife Carrying Contest”, in which husbands carried their wives over their shoulders through an obstacle course. The wives wisely wore bike helmets (a few dropped on their heads – ouch) – but everyone seemed to be having an exceptional time. Later on, the brain freeze ice-cream eating contest attracted several contestants and a good time was had by all.

The next time you’re in the Fond du Lac area, be sure and stop by the Kelley Country Creamery. Not only do the Kelleys make great ice cream, they sure know how to throw a good party.

Starting about the time I was 14 years old – the precise moment when a teen girl’s mind starts to wander away from the farm task at hand and into town where the boys are – my father used to tell me to “stay alert.” One of his favorite sayings was: “Try to stay alert, kid. The world needs more alerts.”

Being June Dairy Month and all, my thoughts are naturally on cheese. Well okay, my thoughts are always on cheese. But this week, I’ve been concentrating on setting up the Second Annual Wisconsin Original Cheese Festival, coming up in November.

Friday Tours: Choose between:

A) Take a behind-the-scenes morning cheesemaking tour of Chalet Cheese Cooperative, enjoy lunch at the legendary Baumgartner’s Cheese Store & Tavern in downtown Monroe, and then embark on an afternoon tour of the award-winning Emmi-Roth Kase cheese plant. You’ll end with an amazing Fondue Tasting in Roth Kase’s culinary center. Start your diet now to prepare for this tour. Limited to 20 people. Tickets: $55.

B) Visit Sassy Cow Creamery, a farmstead dairy plant near Columbus and enjoy a personal behind-the-scenes tour of this milk bottling and cheese plant. Taste cheese curds warm and squeaky, right out of the vat. Enjoy a farmhouse lunch and outdoor tour of the Baerwolf Dairy Farm, with an afternoon pasture walk and up close and personal visit with a herd of dairy cows christened with names like Marlie & Blossom. Limited to 15 people. Tickets: $55.

Friday Dine Around: Experience a culinary sensation at one of seven participating Madison Originals restaurants. Each chef will partner with a Wisconsin cheesemaker and host a one-of-a-kind three-course dinner. You’ll join the featured cheesemaker at a private table for 12. Tickets: $75.

Saturday Morning Farmer’s Market: Join a small group of 4-5 people for a personalized walking tour of the nation’s largest producer-driven Farmer’s Market with personal introductions to more than six cheesemakers. Lunch at Fromagination included. Tickets: $35.

Saturday Night Meet the Cheesemaker Gala

Reception: This is the highlight of the whole weekend. You’ll shake hands and talk shop with 35 Wisconsin rock star cheesemakers and sample 150 original cheeses. This event will again be limited to 300 tickets to allow all attendees 1:1 time with cheesemakers. Tickets: $28.

Blaser’s Cheese is producing a new line of flavored Gouda cheeses, each displaying a different painting by Wisconsin’s famed folk artist Lavern Kammerude.

Jon Metzig grew up – literally – on top of his family’s Union Star cheese factory near Fremont, Wis. He started helping out in the family business at age 7, earned his cheesemaker’s license at age 18, and after graduating from UW-River Falls with a degree in Ag Business and Food Science, did what a lot of young people do: he left home.

After a stint as a cheesemaker at Crave Brothers Farmstead Cheese, and after a two-month trip to work with cheesemakers in Ireland, England and Switzerland, Jon Metzig has at last returned home. Today, he’s once again working with his father – Master Cheesemaker Dave Metzig – but this time, he’s making a cheese he’ll call his own.

St. Jeanne is named after his grandmother – this family has great taste with naming cheeses, don’t you think? 🙂 – and is a semi-soft, washed rind beauty, similar to a Port Salut or Irish Gubbeen cheese – that’s actually Gubbeen pictured above – I was so excited about tasting the cheese when I saw Jon in April that I forgot to take a picture, but it looks very similar). Jon ages it for six weeks and is selling it now as a fairly young, mild stinky cheese. However, he’s thinking about starting to wash and cure some batches with beer, resulting in a heartier, stinkier cheese. He’s trying to figure out if there’s a market for such a cheese (I vote yes).

Jon comes from a long line of cheesemakers, and his family history is a bit colorful. As his father says on the family’s website, it all began with the age-old question of “low fat.”

In the early 1900s, almost all Wisconsin dairy farmers sold their milk to local cheese factories. The introduction of the “Babcock Test” – a method for determining the butterfat content of milk – led to scaled pricing of milk based on fat content. Simply put, cheese factories were only willing to pay top dollar for milk with a high fat content. Thirteen farmers including Jon’s Great-Great Grand Uncle, Henry Metzig, were upset that their milk was considered “low fat,” and responded by starting their own cheese factory as a co-op in Zittau, Wisconsin.

In 1911, Henry bought out the others and formed Union Star. To close that deal, however, Henry had to make a major commitment – agree to work on Sunday. Since the co-op had always been closed on Sunday, the local farmers’ wives had been left to deal with that day’s milk production themselves. This was no small task, because Sundays were focused on preparing the family dinner and going to church. In the end, Henry agreed that it was better for one cheesemaker to go to Hell than all the farmers’ wives.

I guess you can say that the Metzig family’s continued success is due, in part, to the cheesemaking’s own version of women’s liberation. Henry’s daughter, Edna, was one of the first women to become a licensed cheesemaker and work in a factory setting. It was no surprise that soon after marrying local cheesemaker Eugene Lehman, they were running the Union Star factory. What did surprise the neighbors, however, was when they opened a small retail storefront. You see, cheesemakers back then were not known for dealing well with customers.

Jon’s parents, Dave and Jan, bought Union Star from Great-Great Aunt Edna in 1980. Dave had a degree in accounting and, just like his Great Grand Uncle, wanted to run his own business. The family tradition of independent cheesemaking carried the day and the Metzig’s have been there ever since.

It’s good to know the next generation of Metzig cheesemakers is coming up strong. Good luck with your new cheese, Jon, and just remember: the stinkier, the better.

Chefs and cheesemakers have a lot in common, says Dream Dance Chef Jason Gorman. They both work magic with food.

Chef Jason runs Dream Dance restaurant, located inside the Potawatami Casino near Milwaukee. His motto: “Go ahead, use the wrong fork. It’s your call.” Completely devoid of frou-frouism, Chef Jason started the evening by telling the 30 attendees that there are three things that make a good chef. The first: good ingredients – which was the reason he was at Carr Valley that night. As Jason – a native of Chicago – became more acquainted with Wisconsin cheeses during the course of his career, he says the varieties at Carr Valley immediately began to stand out because of their quality and originality.

Each of the three steaks we enjoyed were each seasoned with a different salt. The first steak, a grass fed beef tenderloin from Australia, was served with Maldon Sea Salt, from Essex, England, and Carr Valley Apple Smoked Cheddar. The dish was garnished with was a Saba balsamic syrup, resulting in a sweet finish. The theme of this dish was “sweet and smoky,” with the smokiness coming from the cheese.

As good as the grass-fed steak was, the next dish was even better. A choice New York strip steak, it was served with Carr Valley Goat Feta, tomatoes, black olives, lemon olive oil and red clay salt, harvested from volcanic clay in Hawaii. The lemon really came through strongly, but the Goat Feta provided a nice balance.

As Chef Jason says, “Up to the time I get them, these cows have had a better life than me.”

As if the steak wasn’t amazing enough, the kicker was the seasoning. Finished with Himalayan Sea Salt, a block of sea salt over 250,000 years old, this fabulous dish

was perfectly balanced with Sid’s Black Sheep Truffle cheese. Inspired by the truffled cheese of Italy, Sid created this award-winning sheep milk cheese, which is washed in truffle oil and aged more than six months. It sports a sweet unique earthy flavor and took first place at the 2006 American Cheese Society Competition.

Brace yourselves, cheese geeks. Pleasant Ridge Reserve – possibly the most famous only child farmstead cheese in America – is about to gain a baby brother.

The brainchild behind this new masterpiece is cheesemaker Andy Hatch at Uplands Cheese. Similar to Vacherin Mont d’Or, a soft, rich cow’s milk cheese made in the Jura region of Switzerland and France, Andy’s new cheese will be sold in little round boxes and will be designed to be consumed out of the box, perhaps warmed, and served with a spoon.

Vacherin Mont d’Or is traditionally made from cow’s milk in the fall and winter months, and Andy’s cheese will follow suit, thereby fitting well into Uplands’ schedule, as Pleasant Ridge Reserve is made only in the spring, summer and fall, when cows are eating fresh grass. It will do just fine on winter milk, Andy says, as the style depends not so much on grassy milk notes, but more on the cheesemaker’s ability to put a particular touch on this fragile cheese.

So far, Andy has made several batches of this new raw milk cheese, and is working to age it to the magical date of 60 days – the time needed to sell a raw milk cheese in the United States. A high-fat cheese, it is rich and creamy and held together by a band of spruce tree bark.

Only about 3/4 of a pound in weight, these little wheels will be worth their weight in gold. I tried a version that was three weeks old. It was evident that this cheese is going to be very good, but it will be a challenge to get it to 60 days and still be in good shape to ship and sell. Then again, if anyone can do it, it’s Andy Hatch.

The only problem remaining is its name. Pleasant Ridge Reserve was named after the ridge in which the farm sits – Pleasant Ridge. So it would be logical to name the new cheese after another nearby landmark. Andy says the headwaters to Rush Creek lay on the Uplands farm property, but he thinks Rush Creek sounds like a $4 bottle of wine.

I suggested changing it to Rushing Creek or Rushing Waters and was met with a blank stare and: “Um, right, but it’s called Rush Creek.” So obviously, the name of the cheese will need to be authentic and resonate with Andy, Mike & Carol Gingrich, and the region in which they live. If you’ve got any good ideas, I’m sure they’d be all ears.

If what Uplands cheesemaker Andy Hatch says is true — that half of the secret to making Pleasant Ridge Reserve is simply getting out of the way of the milk and letting its unique properties and flavor profile shine through — then I’d say the other half to the secret of this near-perfect cheese is Andy Hatch himself.

Pleasant Ridge Reserve – arguably the most famous farmstead cheese to come out of America in the 2000s (it captured twin Best of Show awards at the American Cheese Society in 2001 & 2005, and was named the U.S. Championship Cheese in 2003), is a true Wisconsin Original.

Created by Mike Gingrich and the team at the Center for Dairy Research, Pleasant Ridge Reserve is a seasonal Beaufort-style cheese, made only from the milk of cows when they are grazing on fresh grass. Today, Pleasant Ridge Reserve is crafted primarily by cheesemaker Andy Hatch, who joined the Uplands team in 2007, and who with Mike Gingrich (who has by all means, earned the right to slow down a bit), continues to craft the one and only Wisconsin artisan cheese that can be found at nearly every specialty cheese shop and on five-star menus across the country.

While I’ve been a fan of Pleasant Ridge Reserve since I came onto the cheese scene in 2003, I’ve never had the opportunity to actually help craft it until today. My friend Maggie Fitzsimmons
and I talked Andy into letting us crash his 19th day of the season’s cheese make. We arrived just in time to watch him put in the rennet, and then waited for the milk to heat until it was ready to cut.

Then we learned about the process for healing/heating/stirring for creating the perfect curd that makes Pleasant Ridge Reserve. While we were waiting on this process, Andy gave us a tour of the four aging caves, and we got to meet Eric, Maria and Bob – the folks at Uplands who age PRR to perfection. We tasted several ages of this perfect cheese – everything from a sweet 7-month old wheel made last fall, to a nutty, complex 12-month wheel made a year ago, to a 2-year aged wheel that boasted a meaty, earthy flavor.

You can find different ages of PRR at different shops around the country – every cheesemonger prefers a different age. But it’s not just all about age – every batch matures at its own pace, and some batches peak before others. One wheel from each batch is plugged six to eight times to determine the perfect time to ship.

Just as we were starting to learn about a new cheese Andy is working on (more about that later in the week), it was time to head back to the make room. After a bit more heating/stirring, we pumped the curds & whey to the press table, which is actually an old cheddaring table for Kraft, cut in half and customized to fit Uplands’ needs.

Maggie and I were in charge of keeping the curd away from the whey drainage slots, until enough whey was drained to ready the curd mass for pressing. Pleasant Ridge Reserve is pressed under its own whey, one of the steps that makes this Alpine cheese special.

After a period of pressing, it was time to lift the lid and cut the mass – a process Andy and Maria have down to a science. The vat was cut into 72 squares – one square for each cheese form. Andy showed us the proper method for placing the curd squares into each form, using a metaphor that I really can’t repeat here (it was quite effective however), and then we wrapped the cheese cloth around each block, put on the lids, and placed the forms on the press.

Afterward, Andy said it was time to clean and graciously let Maggie & I off the hook, so we could go outside and take a much-needed breather. As if we hadn’t already taken up enough of Andy’s time, he then offered us a tour of the farm.

Mike & Carol Gingrich own the operation as a partnership with Dan & Jean Patenaude. They farm 300 acres, all of which are split into rotational grazing paddocks for their 150 dairy cows. The herd is a unique blend of nine different breeds, resulting in a regular rainbow of bovines. Quiet, friendly and healthy, the Uplands cows are happy cows, producing milk that results in happy cheese. Pleasant Ridge Reserve is definitely a happy cheese, and it’s about to get a sibling – but more on that later this week.

New stats released this week by the USDA reveal specialty cheese production is up 9 percent in Wisconsin, with 92 of the 126 cheese plants in the state now making at least one type of specialty cheese.