France 44 Farm Visits: Redhead Creamery & Shepherd’s Way Farm

by Joe Kastner

Last week, a group of our mongers from the Minneapolis shop got the chance to go visit a couple local creameries and see first-hand where some of our cheeses come from. We got to go visit Redhead Creamery out west in Brooten, and Shepherd’s Way in Nerstrand, which is just down by Northfield. Seeing these family farms, hearing their stories and why they make cheese, this is what our cheese counter is all about: connecting with our neighbors through food and celebrating the talented makers of cheese near and far. 

Redhead Creamery has been making cheese for 10 years now, but this year in particular is bound to be a big one for them. We were greeted by cheesemaker Alise Sjostrom with a bowl of squeaky fresh cheese curds made earlier that morning, who then proceeded to give us a tour of all the new goings-on at the farm. Just within the last month or so, they’ve added some awesome automation for the farming side of things, including an automated milking machine, where the cows milk themselves! This will give Alise and the team even more time for cheesemaking and playing with recipes, as well as their other big project, a new distillery! The Redhead team plans on using the whey from cheesemaking to distill into spirits, and then serve those spirits at their all-new dine-in expansion, which we got to see the development of! We’re all very excited for these next steps at Redhead and can’t wait to see what’s next for them!

The very next day another group got to travel down past Northfield to see Jodi Olsen Read at Shepherd’s Way Farms. Despite some issues with their water well that had just come up the night before, Jodi very graciously hosted us, showed us around the farm, and served us a delicious assortment of sheep’s cheeses, some of which you can find at our cheese counter! We got to tour the milking and make facilities, and even got to see the cavernous upper level of the barn that had just been used for a family wedding reception. Jodi has been making cheese for about 25 years now, and has really honed her craft with the different varieties of cheese Shepherd’s Way puts out. You can also find them at many farmer’s markets around the city, where they also sell their sheep’s milk by the bottle, which is a real treat. We love selling Shepherd’s Way cheeses and hope you’ll try one next time you’re in the shop!

ACS Winners Pt. 4: Uplands Cheese

by Austin Coe Butler

In our weeks-long celebration of American Cheese Society Award Winners, there isn’t a cheese as near and dear to our hearts, and our customers’, as the next big winner: Uplands Cheese Company’s Pleasant Ridge Reserve. As the most awarded cheese in American, Pleasant Ridge Reserve added three more prestigious awards to its name:

Pleasant Ridge Reserve – 3rd Place – Best in Show

Pleasant Ridge Reserve – 1st Place – Washed Rind Cheeses made from cow’s milk

Pleasant Ridge Reserve – 2nd Place – Farmstead Category Aged 60 days or more less than 39% Moisture made from cow’s milk

Pleasant Ridge Reserve is a special cheese for us. It’s been in our case since the shop opened, and over the years our relationship with cheesemaker Andy Hatch and the team at Uplands has become one of our most cherished. Now, with over fifteen years of friendship, we hand-select the batches of Pleasant Ridge we sell during visits to the dairy. Last year, in an exciting development, we invited Andy to the Events space to invite customers to participate in batch selection as well. Put simply, Pleasant Ridge is great cheese made by great people doing great things for their cows, community, and environment. Whenever an inquisitive customer comes to the cheese counter unsure of where to start eating their way thoughtfully through the multifarious world of cheese, I hand them a wedge of Pleasant Ridge Reserve.

Fans of Uplands’ other cheese, Rush Creek Reserve, might wonder where it is on the list of ACS winners, and the answer is, it isn’t! For good reason. Rush Creek Reserve is a highly seasonal cheese, made during the autumn when the cows transition from fresh pasture to cured hay producing a milk that is less in volume but richer in fat. It arrives in October and is sold out by January, so you won’t ever see it judged by ACS in May, which, frankly, I find refreshing. In an increasingly institutionalized world where we use awards and accolades to justify our tastes, or worse, build our tastes from them, the personal pleasure of food remains a radical tool for conviviality. De gustibus non est disputandum. Pleasant Ridge Reserve doesn’t taste any better with each award it wins. It tastes great in spite of them.

As a beautiful melter and a great snaking cheese that can handle the summer heat, Pleasant Ridge Reserve is the perfect cheese to have a big wedge of this Labor Day weekend. And as an added level of intrigue, those of us who tried the day’s batch that was judged at ACS this year thought the two batches we selected alongside our customers were even better! Come visit the shop the weekend to grab and wedge and taste why it continues to remain America’s most awarded cheese!

ACS Winners Pt. 3: Shepherd’s Way

by Austin Coe Butler

Continuing our series on American Cheese Society Award Winners, this week we’re featuring another Minnesota winner—Shepherd’s Way Farm in Nerstrand! Shepherd’s Way won in the following categories:

Burr Oak – 3rd Place – Sheep’s Milk Cheese Aged Over 60 Days

Sogn – 3rd Place – Farmstead Category Sheep’s Milk Cheese Aged Over 60 Days

What more needs to be written about Shepherd’s Way Farm? I maintain that Jodi is the nicest person working in cheese, which is saying a lot, and that Shepherd’s Way is producing some of the best cheese in the state. 

Their ACS winning cheeses are no exception. Burr Oak an extra-firm, extra-nutty aged cheese is a special release and isn’t currently available, but Sogn Tomme (pronounced SOHN) has become a year-round counter staple for us. It’s bright, mineral tang makes it the perfect companion whether you’re enjoying the summer sun or burrowed away in the bleak, midwinter. Sogn is one of Shepherd’s Way’s newest cheeses, and last year at ACS it actually won 1st place in its category!

We have a lovely selection of Shepherd’s Way cheeses in our case at the moment from their creamy brie-like Hidden Falls and tangy Big Woods Blue to Sogn Tomme and a few flavors of Shepherd’s Hope, their divine, fresh sheep’s milk cheese that is somewhere between feta and mozzarella in taste and consistency. To me, Shepherd’s Way Farm’s cheeses all scream refreshing, something we’ll need this broiling weekend. Swing by the shop this week to try some more award winning cheese made right here in Minnesota (and enjoy the AC)!

ACS Winners Pt. II: Alemar Cheese Company

by Austin Coe Butler

This week, in our month-long celebration of American Cheese Society Award Winners, it’s time for the hometown hero: Alemar Cheese Company! Alemar won in the following categories:

Apricity – 1st Place – Soft-Ripened Cheeses made from Cow’s Milk

Blue Earth – 2nd Place – Soft-Ripened Cheeses made from Cow’s Milk 

This means that in the category of soft-ripened cheeses made from cow’s milk Alemar took both top spots! Let me rephrase that: Out of all the soft-ripened cow’s milk cheeses that were submitted from across the nation, not one but two cheeses from right here in Minneapolis rose to the top in America’s fiercest food-fight!

What’s also remarkable about Apricity’s win is that Apricity was only created last September—this is a debut win. Within just a few months it’s become the darling of the American artisan cheese scene, and it’s easy to see why. With its gorgeous orange glow, mouse-like texture, a bright, lactic tang, Apricity is a crave-able cheese for all occasions.

Alemar Cheese Company was founded in 2008 by Keith Adams in Mankato. Keith wanted to make artisanal, French-inspired soft-ripened cheeses like Brie and Camembert using milk from small Minnesota family farms. Their first cheese was Bent River, a Camembert-style cheese that quickly picked up two ACS honors and a Good Food Award. In 2019, Keith and his team moved to the FOOD BUILDING in NE Minneapolis where Charlotte Serino joined as Head Cheesemaker. 

We currently have Apricity, Boom Island, their smaller camembert-style cheese, and Sakatah,  a soft cheese wrapped in grape leaves and soaked in Brandy, in our case. Stop by the cheese counter this weekend to try a sample of Alemar’s cheeses and taste what makes them award-winning!

Grayson Returns!

by Austin Coe Butler

Like the vegetable world, cheese, too, follows the seasons. Spring brings the first, fresh cheeses like mushroomy bries with their ramp-like aromas and bone-white chèvres with their bright tang of mint, rhubarb, and radishes. Summer brings with it sweet, milk-laden mozzarella, juicy like a tomato, and the first aged cheeses. Alpines and Cheddars ripen with apples on autumn days, and as the weather cools, the flavors warm. Long winter nights settle in, and the bold, savory melters like Raclette are brought to the fire, truckles of Stilton are cracked open, and decadent, woodsy wheels of spruce-girdled Rush Creek Reserve, Winnimere, and Vacherin Mont d’Or are scooped from their rinds. Some cheeses are ephemeral, having only one season, while others have several. Among the greatest cheeses that follows its own seasons is Grayson.

Grayson is a humble, smear ripened cheese made by Meadow Creek Dairy in Galax, Virginia nestled in the southwestern Appalachian. Its rubrous hue and square shape immediately evoke Taleggio and other smear ripened cheeses. These smear ripened cheeses, soft cheeses that are “washed” in or smeared with a morge or brine, are celebrated for their funky, briny, meaty flavors, and their pungent aromas. There’s a good reason why: bacteria only found in marine environments are inexplicably found on these cheeses, along with various species of Brevibacterium, a genus of bacteria that thrive in damp, salty environments like smear ripened cheeses or… your feet! Grayson has all these flavors in its unique way. It is beefy, barn-yardy, and runny, with some of its best wheels reminding me of heavily larded refried pinto beans. But this is a description of winter Grayson. Summer Grayson is delectably different.

The folks at Meadow Creek Dairy are real American artisans. The Feete family began making cheese in 1998, and ever since then they’ve shown a dedication to their cows and their craft. Their cows are always on pasture, never confined, and they only graze on grass. They follow active grazing practices, rotating the cows from one pasture to the next to avoid overgrazing. Meadow Creek Dairy also keeps a closed herd of Jersey cows bred over the past thirty years specifically for their postage stamp of land in the Virginia highlands. Their cheesemakers work with minutes old milk that comes into the creamery straight from the milking parlor, and they let the raw, Jersey milk shine. All of Meadow Creek’s cheeses have a hallmark, vibrant, beta-carotene rich color from that beautiful milk. Meadow Creek celebrates the seasonal nature of their milk and cheese.

So while winter Grayson is stronger in flavor and softer in texture, summer Grayson is milder, tangier, firmer, and springier. The aroma is subtle, like yeasted bread, or the foamy head of an unfiltered beer. The flavors are bright, salty, and milky, while the paste retains a lovely buoyant bounce in the center and a supple creamline. Because of its milder nature, summer is a great time to try Grayson if you haven’t before or are unfamiliar with smear ripen cheeses. It can be paired alongside crisp whites and medium bodied reds, but it really deserves to be paired alongside a perspiring glass of frothy or Hefeweizen in the summer sun.

There’s always a hiatus with Grayson in the spring. The winter’s batches have been consumed, and while the cows rest and the grass grows, we wait. With the return of Grayson, we know summer has arrived! To celebrate its arrival with summer we’ll be sampling this cheese all weekend long, so stop by the shop to pick up a wedge!

(Real) American Cheese

By Austin Coe Butler

Did you know that May is American Cheese Month? No, we’re not celebrating that big block of orange stuff made by Kraft (which isn’t actually cheese), but real cheese made from curds and whey by artisans, families, and small producers! With the arrival of American Cheese Month along with the return of American Cheese Society's Judging and Competition to Minneapolis, I thought it would be worthwhile to write about how American cheese is unique and what the state of it is.

Prior to the arrival of European colonists, there was no cheese in the Americas. The mammals whose milk is best suited to make cheese—cows, sheep, goats, water buffalos, and yaks—were absent until the Columbian Exchange. Additionally, the indigenous populations, like the majority of the world’s population to this day, were lactose intolerant and had not developed the genetic mutation that allows some people to continue producing lactase, the enzyme responsible for breaking down the problematic milk sugar lactose after weaning. With the exception of llama milk, which was occasionally consumed by Andean cultures, no dairying traditions were present in the “New World.”

American cheese inherited its traditions from its historical patterns of immigration. The first cheeses in the Americas were made in Mexico by Spanish settlers. These fresh cheeses like queso fresco and queso Oaxaca were simple to make and could be consumed immediately. English pilgrims arriving in the Northeast brought with them the dairying traditions of butter and pressed, aged cheeses like Cheddar and Cheshire. Subsequent waves of immigration brought us Italian inspired cheeses like parmesan, German cheeses like Limburger,  and Mexican cheeses like Monterey, among others. 

America has been the source of many great innovations in cheese, but particularly in the production and aging of Cheddar. Owing to the hot, humid summers of the Northeast, British colonists found that their truckles of Cheddar and Cheshire would crack. They found that by wrapping or “bandaging” the cheeses in cloth—cheap, disposable, and readily available from the supply of cotton harvested by the enslaved on Southern plantations—helped limit the cracking, thus inventing the clothbound format that we often think of with English Cheddars, although they are very American. In the 19th and 20th century, petroleum products like paraffin wax and plastic vacuum bags created even better impermeable seals, allowing Cheddar to be aged for impossible timespans of twenty, thirty, or even forty years, opening up incredible new vistas of flavor. America was also home to the first cheese factory, a Cheddar factory in upstate New York founded in 1851 by Jesse Williams. Cheddar became a ubiquitous part of American life when it was included in welfare, eventually being enshrined in the American lexicon as slang for money. It was only in 2016 when Mozzarella, by way of our ravenous pizza consumption, usurped Cheddar as the most consumed cheese in America. 

American artisan cheese naturally has many of the qualities we like to associate our national identity. Unhinged by tradition and unbound by strict regulatory titles like PDOs or AOCs, American artisan cheese has an opened mindedness and freedom of expression when it comes to cheesemaking. You’ll see the rugged individualism so central to American mythology in the names of cheese; lacking the regional traditions of Europe like Roquefort, Parmigiano Reggiano, or Gruyère, you’ll find names like Pleasant Ridge Reserve, Midnight Moon, Humboldt Fog, or Pawlet. You’ll also find individual figures hailed as founders for the nascent farmhouse cheese industry like Judy Schad, Mary Keehan, and Laura Chenel of the “American goat ladies”, David and Cindy Major of Vermont Shepherd, or Marian Pollack and Marjorie Susman of the storied Orb Weaver Farm. 

While many American cheeses are inspired by European recipes and styles of cheese—much to the chagrin of European producers—American cheesemakers are able to use them as a point of departure. Take Pleasant Ridge Reserve for example, an Alpine cheese inspired by the tradition of European alpage, but made in Wisconsin, with cows bred for a postage stamp of pasture in Dodgeville to make milk that becomes cheese and, ultimately, an expression of American terroir. There are also some incredible experiments going on right now like the Cornerstone Project to create the first truly “American Cheese,” which we carry from Cato Corner.

America is the fastest growing market for artisan cheese in the world, and there’s good reason why the giants of European fromagerie greedily eye American producers, as the recent acquisitions of artisan doyennes Cyprus Grove and Cowgirl Creamery by the Swiss Emmi AG shows. In 2016 with the crowning of Rogue River Blue as the “World’s Best Cheese,” American cheese arrived on the global stage to the scandal of Europe. Like the dream pursued by so many here, American cheese is filled with limitless potential, in addition to incredible stories and flavors. To celebrate American cheese, we’re promoting cheese from all over the country, from Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, to California, Vermont, Connecticut, and, heck, even Tennessee, with a 15% discount. Come to the shop to sample some American cheeses and discover what makes our cheeses so delicious and unique!

Want to more know and try some of the best cheeses America has to offer? Join us in our gorgeous new events space on June 20th for our class on American Artisan Cheese!

Hand-Pulled Mozzarella: Your Weekly Cheese Lesson

by Austin Coe Butler

Mozzarella season is my favorite season, and for those of you who have enjoyed our fresh mozzarella, I bet it’s your favorite season, too. Its return to the shop is a sign that Spring has arrived—no matter how dazed.

Mozzarella is a pasta filata style of cheese, meaning “stretched curd” or “spun paste.” This name is demonstrative of how cheeses in this style are made: starting with curd, boiling water is added until the curd begins to melt or stretch into an elastic “paste,” at which point it is pulled into strands and formed into a variety of shapes. At the scientific level, the boiling water loosens the (casein) protein structure, aligning them into strands with pockets of fat and whey in between. Burrata, provolone, scamorza, caciocavallo, string cheese, and many other cheeses from around the world are made following this technique.

Mozzarella takes its name from mozzare meaning “to cut, chop” and that’s exactly how this cheese is made. Those long “threads” are bundled into a ball and then “cut” by hand. Mozzarella as we know it originated in southern Italy, with written records dating from the 16th, but undoubtedly it and other pasta filata cheeses have been around for much longer. The Italians would call our mozzarella fior di latte as it is made from cow’s milk. The title of mozzarella in Italy is reserved for water buffalo’s milk.

Because of its elastic nature, mozzarella can be formed into a variety of shapes, from simple ciliegene (small, cherry sized balls), tied in knots (nodini), or woven into braids (treccia). Master casaros can sculpt the cheese into little pigs, pacifiers, even the divinely inspired Treccia di Santa Croce di Magliano, a shawl woven from mozzarella. Among the most impressive are maybe Georgian tenili cheeses. Then there are the stuffed cheese like the suggestively shaped, milk filled zizzone, or la filiata, a “pregnant” mozzarella filled with smaller balls of mozzarella.

Without divulging my secrets, here is how I make fresh mozzarella at France 44. On Friday and Saturday mornings I break up the cold blocks of firm curd by hand in a large bowl. Then, I pour over boiling brine and cover the bowl with a lid, waiting a few minutes for the curd to temper. Once the curd is warm, I pour off most of the brine and add new brine to the bowl. At this point, the magic of mozzarella begins. Working quickly with a large paddle, I start to twirl the curd, plying it onto the paddle and lifting it into the air, high above my head. Thin, thread-like strands begin to form immediately and draw out as a beautiful waterfall-like sheet of curd unfurls. I do this only about twice to work most of the lumps out. It’s important to not overwork the curd as this can lead to squeaky, tough mozzarella. Just as perilous is melting the curd with too much boiling water.

Then I plunge my (clean!) bare hands into the boiling brine and quickly pull the threads into a tight ball before cutting it free from the rest of the mozzarella by pinching my thumb and forefinger closed. I wrap the hot mozzarella in plastic wrap and let it sit while I continue to pull the rest of the batch. As it cools, the mozzarella retains its spherical shape. (The traditional way to reserve fresh mozzarella is to leave it in brine—but this isn’t practical for us.) The actual process of making mozzarella takes less than a minute. Of course, I have to sample the mozzarella to make sure the seasoning is right, and as it’s often the first thing I eat in the morning along with my coffee, I’ve found that mozzarella and black coffee is quite a nice pairing, almost like having a bit of cream.

I’ll typically make a few burrata as well, adding truffles, nuts, herbs, or seasonal fruit to the stracciatella filling that goes inside burrata. Sometimes I’ll make a sfoglia for the staff to eat, a popular snack at caseificios wherein mozzarella is stretched into a sheet covered in prosciutto, arugula, balsamic vinegar, or whatever filling you like, then rolled tightly and cut into slices to be eaten by hand.

Fresh mozzarella is best enjoyed on the day it was made and at room temperature, preferably the same day it was made. If I don’t devour it immediately, I leave it out on my cool kitchen counter away from the sun for 24-48 hours. Refrigeration prolongs the life of fresh mozzarella for about a week, but at the cost of the cheese’s texture and flavor—that supple, buoyant spring tightens up and the milky brine is soaked back into the cheese. Of course, fresh mozzarella is great in all the traditional applications: in a sandwich, on a pizza, in a caprese salad with ripe tomatoes, basil, and balsamic vinegar. But consider trying it in something new this year, like supplì al telefono, or garnished with chili crisp or a smoky, spicy salsa macha. It’s delicate, milky flavor makes it highly versatile. 

If you haven’t made fresh mozzarella before, I encourage you to take a mozzarella making class with me this summer! Without a doubt these classes are the most fun I have at France 44. We dunk our hands into scalding hot water, stretching and spinning the cheese, screaming with laughter, all while Italian retro hits from the 70s blare in the background. At the end, we eat the fruits of our labor. Everyone, no matter how filled with trepidation or self-doubt, always leaves having made fresh mozzarella they share with their friends and family. I have to say, to this day my best student has been an eleven year old girl! You know who you are! 

We frequently sell out of fresh mozzarella and burrata, so I’d encourage you to stop by the shop as early as you can to pick up one of these soft, still warm, balls of mozzarella.

Minnesota Cheeses

By Austin Coe Butler

When it comes to cheese, Minnesota is often outshined by the bright, milky star of its neighbor, Wisconsin. There’s a reason Wisconsin is called “America’s Dairyland” after all, with its storied history of dairying and cheesemaking powered by the “Wisconsin Idea,” massively influential milk and cheese lobbies, and a rigorous Master Cheesemaker program. It’s one of the few states you can make a decent living making cheese. But Minnesota has its own remarkable history of cheesemaking, and today many incredible local cheesemakers are producing some of the best and most innovative cheeses in the country.

For instance, did you know that America’s first blue cheese was made here in Minnesota nearly two-hundred years ago? The greater St. Paul area was once known as the Blue Cheese Capital of America. When the St. Peter’s Sandstone was glaciated thousands of years ago, intricate limestone caves were formed. Being porous, limestone is ideal for aging cheeses, and there’s a reason why the legendary ewe’s milk blue cheese Roquefort originated in the ancient limestone caverns of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon. These caves are stilled used today by the Caves of Faribault.

Joe Sherman cut his cheesemaking teeth in those very same caves when he was 19 back in the 1980s. In 2005, he founded Northern Lights in Plato, Minn., about 50 miles west of the Twin Cities. Joe only makes 100 wheel batches of his Northern Lights Blue from fresh, unpasteurized milk from a local herd of cows that grazes on pasture year round. Its bright, peppery, and salty flavor and crumbly yet creamy texture are the hallmarks of a classic American blue cheese that is right at home in blue cheese dressing, on a steak, or by itself.

Redhead Creamery in Brooten makes the petite American brie Little Lucy and spicy Red Temper Cheddar, which you may have see at the State Fair with a ribbon pinned to it. The Little Lucys are perfect for a twosome or a picnic with their creamy, lemony brightness that’s a bit more mellow than your French bries. Redhead Creamery just won an award from the Dairy Business Innovation Alliance (DBIA) for their venture to get artisan cheesemakers into the artisan alcohol market by making fermented whey beverages more accessible to smaller producers.

Alemar Cheese, founded by Kieth Adams here in Minneapolis in 2008, immediately gained acclaim for their first cheese, the Camembert-style Bent River (which you’ll find in our case as the smaller Boom Island.) Their washed-rind Good Thunder is funky, fudgy, and barn-yardy in all the right ways. Alemar Cheese now operates out of the Food Building in NE Minneapolis. Apricity, their newest cheese, is a bright, lactic-set cheese that immediately became a staff favorite with its tangy flavor and mousse-like texture. Charlotte Serino, the head cheesemaker, has been making some big waves on the national stage with her cheeses!

And of course there’s Shepherd’s Way in Nerstrand, run by Stephen and Jodi Ohlsen Read. We currently have their aged sheep’s milk tomme Friesago, which will transport you to the Tuscan countryside, the decadent, brie-like Hidden Falls, and Big Woods Blue.

We’ll be celebrating Minnesota cheese and cheesemakers all weekend long, so stop by the shop to try some home-state heroes!

Fermier Jouvence

By Austin Coe Butler

To the despair of some of our customers, you can’t get a “real” French Camembert in the United States, and by “real” they mean a camembert made with raw, unpasteurized milk. Raw milk is hard to come by in the US, and currently the FDA has a federal prohibition on the sale of raw milk cheeses under 60 days of age. That’s why, with the very special exception of one cheese, when you look at our case all the soft cheese is pasteurized. But I’m convinced that the soft cheeses we carry from Ferme de Jouvence are the closest you can get to a “real,” raw French Camembert or Brie in the United States, and they’re a revelation to most people.

What sets these cheeses apart from others it the way they are made. The French have a unique classification system for cheese. Cheeses from Ferme de Jouvence are fermier, or farmhouse, meaning that the cheese is made on the same farm where the milk comes from. It’s generally regarded as one of the highest quality standards, signifying that everything from rearing and milking the animals to making the cheese and maturing it all takes place on the farm. But to call these cheeses fermier is almost an understatement, because Ferme de Jouvence is dedicated to a holistic approach to the whole process of agriculture.

Situated in the small commune of La Boissière-École alongside the Rambouillet forest, just 25 miles southwest of Paris, Ferme de Jouvence has been family run and operated for generations and is home to about 150 cows and 400 goats. The name of the farm, Ferme de Jouvence, translates roughly to “Farm of Rejuvenation” and they are committed to organic, regenerative farming practices. The landscape of the farm is dominated by chestnuts, oaks, and firs, providing shade to the animals in the summer. Fields of cereal grains, white mustard, daikon, alfalfa, and buckwheat are grown in succession to promote soil health and provide fodder for the animals. Their rich, whole milk is used within 12 hours of milking to make cheese. The farm also utilizes a “methanizer,” which resembles a large bladder that collects methane from the animals’s manure and converts it into biogas to power the farm and organic fertilizer to rejuvenate the fields, which in turn feeds the animals, is turned into milk, then cheese, and so on again and again. 

Ferme de Jouvence does not need to export their cheese. They could easily sell all their cheese locally, and importing such a small amount of cheese to the United States must be a legal and logistical nightmare for them. But by their mercy or beneficence they have decided to export cheese to us, and the difference in flavor and quality is worth it. 

If you’ve only ever had Brillat Savarin, Delice de Bourgogne, or Fromage d’Affinois, more modern, refined double and triple crèmes, I encourage you to try Ferme de Jouvence’s Brie Fermier or Camembert Fermier. (For those of you wondering what the difference between brie and camembert is, it mostly comes down to size: camemberts tend to be small rounds between 5-8 inches while bries can be large, shield-like disks.) They both have a rich, buttery paste like good French salted butter and, owing to the mold Penicilium camemberti on the rind, they have a distinct, complex aroma of freshly cut broccoli, snapped asparagus, or crimini mushrooms still with some dirt from the forest floor on them. Recently, when I included Brie Fermier in a class, the students' reaction to trying this cheese was marked by audible gasps and jubilant exclamations!

Ferme de Jouvence also makes three other cheeses. For those looking for a more mild entry point into the world of French farmstead cheeses, consider Ferme de Jouvence’s St. Jacques, a step up from Fromage d’Affinois in terms of flavor with a little bit of a cultured butter flavor. Ferme de Jouvence also makes a goat Camembert, Jouvenceau, which is one of the creamiest goat cheeses I’ve ever had and a great substitute for your typical Camembert. They also make an ash-rinded goat blue cheese called Persillé de Chevre, with a fudgey texture and a nice balance of blue spice and goat pepperiness.

Swiss Cheese: Beyond the Deli Slice

by Austin Coe Butler

When we think of Swiss cheese in the United States, we might think of a pale, thin slice of cheese with holes in it that tastes like plastic and is not that dissimilar from its parody on the receiving end of a mousetrap. We might also think of a bubbling pot of fondue or blistered raclette. We might even be able to name one cheese, Gruyère. This is the sum total of Swiss cheese for most Americans. The Swiss, though, have an august tradition of making a rich diversity of cheeses that rivals that of the French and were it not for the actions of a nefarious cheese cartel our associations with Swiss cheese would be much more bountiful.

The stark geography of the grand and imposing Swiss Alps led to the creation of hundreds of distinct, regional cheeses. Many of these traditional cheeses fall under the category of “Alpine” or cooked, pressed cheeses. The harsh winters and relative isolation of settlements required farmers to band together and pool their milk to create huge wheels of Gruyère, Emmental, and Sbrinz that could be eaten throughout the winter. During the Alpine cheesemaking process, the curd is cooked at a high temperature and cut finely to the size of a pea to drive more liquid whey out of the curd. Then the curd is pressed into moulds to drive even more whey out. Cheeses with high moisture in them spoil quickly and large cheeses especially can rot from the inside, bulge with gas, and then “heave” or explode! Some Swiss cheesemakers mastered this art though, as in Emmental or “Swiss,” which has a distinct bulge in its wheel and large holes or eyes from the gas produced by a specific bacteria, Proprionibacteria.

Another unique feature of Swiss cheese is the access to incredible mountain pastures in the summer. High on the mountainsides, when the snow has melted, vibrant meadows become accessible. Owing to a scarcity of farmland, shepherds took their flocks from the valleys onto the mountainsides to forage these wild, mountain pastures comprised of herbs, wildflowers, and grasses and found they produced some of the finest milk, butter, and cheese. This act of transhumance, the high altitude meadows, and the composition of pasture, all came to be known as Alpage.

The isolation of each each Alp or Alpage ensures that they have their own unique style of cheese with its own terroir. Speaking about terroir and cheese may sound farcical to some, but cheese is an incredibly dynamic food. We once carried two wheels of Gruyère Alpage from opposite sides of the same valley and the difference in flavor between them left some incredulous: one was deeply savory, like sugar cured bacon and caramelized onions, while the other was delicate in flavor, with a fruitiness and subtle tang like a fine alpine strawberry.

How then did this incredible tradition and regional diversity of cheese become so debased? The Schweizerei Käseunion (Swiss Cheese Union). Many refer to it as the Swiss Cheese Cartel because it operated like a cartel. It exerted total control over every facet of cheese production in Switzerland from marketing at home and abroad to quality control enforcement and price regulation. They benefitted from keeping prices high and competition low, producing and promoting primarily Emmental, Gruyère, Sbrinz, and Appenzeller, while actively discouraging the production of other lesser known cheeses, let alone newly invented ones. They purposefully mislabeled lower quality cheeses bound for the export market to demand a higher price. The Swiss Cheese Cartel is responsible for our associations with Emmental as “Swiss” cheese, as they had large stockpile of old Emmental they needed to move and in turn led an aggressive marketing campaign of fondue in Switzerland as well as abroad. Melting cheese in a pot is a very old tradition for many people, but what we distinctly think of as “fondue” is also the confabulation of the Swiss Cheese Union. (The proliferation of the term fondue also led to the creation of chocolate fondue which was made to sell, surprise, a Swiss chocolate, Toblerone.)

In 1999, though, the Swiss Cheese Cartel buckled under a corruption scandal and Swiss cheesemakers were free to return to their traditional cheeses and innovate new ones. Independent cheese makers like Walter Räss, Jumi, the Tschudi family, and importers like Caroline Hofstettler through her program Adopt an Alp, are all doing their part to restore and preserve the vibrant tradition of cheesemaking in Switzerland.

What better weekend to celebrate Swiss cheese than one where we’re buried in so much snow it feels like we’re on an Alp? Strap on your snowshoes and trudge into the shop this week to try some fabulous Swiss cheese, all 15% off through Sunday!