TNT Cheese Goes with A Bang
Scotsman - Edinburgh,Scotland,UK

Well, the end of my second week as a farmer is almost upon me, and I realize I haven’t updated the blog all this week. To make amends, I’ve posted a bunch of photos below. Enjoy.

Since I last posted, quite a lot has happened. I’ve learned how to drive a tractor (a pretty big one, I might add); I’ve gone through the whole cheesemaking process - doing all the steps rather than simply watching. Cutting curd is probably the trickiest part, though, in all honesty, none of this is really rocket science. It’s really just a matter of paying attention to what’s going on around you and being careful. That goes for the cows as well as the cheese. The difference is the cheese won’t kill you if you screw it up. Chances are the cows won’t either, but I suppose the possibility is always there.

On Sunday, after my day off, I felt like absolute crap. I was exhausted most of the day and whacked my head pretty hard on the grain intake valve and spent most of the day achy and ill feeling. I think that this was all the result of doing more physical work in a week than I’ve done in the past year. Day to day, it was fine. But once I got some rest my body just kind of shut down. When I woke up on Monday morning, though, I felt 100% better.

On Monday, we lost a calf. After milking, we moved the cows to a new pasture. The calf, Cordelius, decided that it didn’t want to go and took off in the other direction. Brennen - one of the other interns - and I tried our best to catch him, but he got past us and, somehow, out of the barnyard and back to the “home field,” where the cows had spent the past week or so. We all went looking for him a few times throughout the day, but saw no sign.

The next morning, milking proceeded as normal, except for Cordelia — the missing calf’s mother — who was mooing for her calf the whole time. Halfway through the milking, we looked out into the barnyard and saw the calf out on the other side of the fence. He was hungry, trying to milk off of the dry cows in the yard, but was otherwise fine.

For me, this week has been all about developing a routine. On Friday — tomorrow — Jonathan is going to Union Square farmer’s market and Jackie (another intern) and I will be milking the cows and making the cheese by ourselves. While this isn’t the first time unsupervised for Jackie, it is for me. I’ll report back on how it all goes tomorrow.

This Saturday, I’ll be working at the Lincoln Center farmer’s market in Manhattan. Sunday I’m off, and that’s the end of week number two.

UPDATE: I ended up posting this on Friday, after the day’s cheesemaking. All went well. In addition to Jackie and myself, we had help from Lise, a woman who volunteers here on a weekly basis. Jackie, who’s been here a month longer than me, has done this unattended before…but this was my first time. Besides a leaky valve, we had no issues to speak of. There’s still a lot to learn, but I have the basic procedure pretty much down.

Sorry it’s been a little while. Here are some new photos — taken by Joel, a friend of Brennen’s.

Cows outside

Cows inside — getting milked

Brennen holding the milking apparatus

Me, milking

Richie and Justine — don’t try this at home

John the bull

The rooster

Belgians are consuming more cheese
Expatica - Netherlands

Sales of cheese up after milk loss
Shropshire Star - Telford,England,UK

I writing this from the comfort of my Brooklyn couch.

Yesterday I worked the farmer’s market in Union Square. One would think that this would be relatively mellow compared to the typical farm day, but that’s not quite the case. For one thing, the day is longer. I met Jonathan and another worker at the market at 7:30am to unpack the van and set up everything. By the time we were done packing up the van at the end of the day, it was 7:30pm.

Even though I put in a solid 12-hour day, I got off relatively easy. My commute was only a 1/2 hour each way by subway (I came back into the city on Thursday night). Jonathan’s commute was two hours each way — driving — putting his work day at 16 hours total.

In addition to the hours, the market is really a lot of work — all performed on your feet. Yesterday started out cold and rainy and, as a result, pretty quiet. Even so, there was a steady stream of customers throughout the morning and afternoon. The two bug rushes occur, predictably, at lunchtime and again around 5:30, when the office workers get set free.

The market is a lot of fun, though. As Jonathan told me, it’s where all the glory lies. People are truly excited about what we’re doing on the farm. They love to hear about the cows and calves. They dig the bread. Most of all, they’re excited about the cheese.

Yesterday’s big hit was a cheese called Baudolino — the first cheese we’re selling with this season’s milk. The cheese is just over 60-days old — the youngest raw-milk cheese can be by law — and is extremely soft and oozy. So oozy, in fact, that in the van and in the aging cave on the farm, the cheese drips down onto the racks below it. There are stalagmites stalactites of delicious cheese hanging down below. Laid out on a board, it collapses under its own weight, spreading out in a lumpy pancake fashion.

Relatively mild with a grassy sweetness, it’s really a great cheese. The customers agreed. Regulars were excited to see a new cheese and, by the end of the day, people were coming up to the table saying things like, “I hear you have a new cheese; I have to try it.” Despite the rain and chill, we sold out of all three wheels we had with us.

Scotland’s Strathdon Blue — Available in the US

Today was all about the cows. We started the morning at 7:45am — not bad at all — with breakfast at the main house. From there, we went out to bring the cows in for milking. Today was a reunion of sorts for the herd, as we joined the group of bulls and dry females we moved yesterday with the group of milking cows.

The moving of the cows was fairly uneventful in and of itself. The unification of the herd took place in the barnyard. It was there I first witnessed what others were calling the “sommelier sniff.” This would occur any time a female would urinate. Hearing the noise, a bull — usually John, the big Kerry — would run over and stick his snout directly in the stream (stream is putting politely, for those who haven’t witnessed a cow pissing). Pulling his nose out, dripping wet, the bull then parts his lips, exposing his teeth, throws his head back, and inhales deeply through his nostrils, sniffing for the scent of ovulation. This would continue throughout the milking.

We herded the cows into the barn and locked them into their stanchions. For some of the cows, this was easy; for others, it was a bit of work. This was really my first direct contact with the cows, nudging, pushing, and pulling them into place. Though admittedly a little timid at first, I got the feel for being around them as the morning progressed. I was a bit wary with John and the other bulls roaming freely in the barn while all this was going on, but it wasn’t so bad. I just made sure to always keep one eye out and made sure I didn’t get between the boys and the girls.

The milking itself was fairly intuitive. The milk line is a vacuum pump affair. There are four sets of silicone or rubber/stainless-steel cups which attach to the udders and draw the milk out. The milk travels down the line, through a filter, and directly into the cheese vat. After showing me how to hook up one cow, Jonathan and I worked our way down the line, milking four at time.

For the most part, hooking up a cow is a one-person job. And, really, it’s quite easy after the first one — as long as the cow is cooperating. Since there’s a vacuum, it’s really just a case of lining the cup up with the teat and sliding it on. When a seal is created, the cup slides right in place with a fairly satisfying slurp. Repeat three times per cow and you’re in business. If all’s in order, all four udders release their milk, which you can see entering the cup. Some cows take a little longer than others - and some take a little massaging to get going. We did all sixteen currently being milked in just about an hour, apparently not too bad for my first time out — and the first time this season the herd has been back together (minus the babies, of course).

One thing about milking is the muck (again, putting it politely). An unavoidable fact of this business is the manure. It basically follows you around the barn - and you always have to be on the lookout for a cow relieving herself. To get the milking apparatus on and off a cows, you’re pretty much squatting right under the thing. I don’t want to give anyone the impression that I was in any way shat upon, but I was most definitely in close contact with the stuff. After the first few minutes, though, you really do get used to it. Turns out, too, that it washes right off.

An interesting little tidbit I picked up today — one I assume will come in handy many times — is that if you want to deny a cow the ability to kick, you pull it’s tail. A couple of the cows have a habit of kicking as the milking apparatus is being put on and taken off. For these cows, I would pull the tail back and up — fairly hard — and Jonathan took care of attaching. Sure enough, if one started to kick a little, all it took was a harder tug to put an immediate stop to it.

After milking, we made cheese. I mostly observed while one of the other interns and Jonathan did their thing. I’ve seen the process quite a few times now, though, and done it at home (albeit on a much smaller scale) a few times, so I’m hoping I’ll get to move up pretty quickly. I did do a lot of washing and fetching, though, so I wasn’t entirely dead weight.

Other than that, the only other work-related items today was a quick trip out into the fields to open up another pasture for the herd to graze. The biggest shock to my system was probably lugging milk jugs full of whey up to the babies, but I think I’ll get used to that chore pretty quickly.

One of the other interns told me he’ll always remember his first morning out here — looking around, taking it all in. I know what he means — and feel the same way.

Some photos from the apprentice house window and front door:

View from my bedroom window on this, my first morning.

Calves in the apprentice field — just out the front door.

More calves, same field.

I arrived this morning at approximately 11:30am, having left Brooklyn at the same time that Kari left for work. When I pulled up, Jonathan was in the middle of making cheese with a guy about my age who’s just starting to work at Bobolink a day or so a week. While working on the cheese, he was chatting with a woman who’ll be working at the farmer’s markets in New York.

After some lunch — where I met Bobolink’s full-time employee and two of the other interns — we finished the cheese making process and cleaned up. Then a bunch trooped out into one of the fields to check up on the state of the grass and meet some of the cows.

Next up was moving some temporary electric fencing around to create a new grazing area for the sheep. There are four total - one ewe, a ram, a wether, and a lamb. They’re not being milked or anything right now. They seem rather ornamental at this point.

After the sheep were taken care of it was back out into the field to move the bulls and dry ladies onto another pasture. Tomorrow at milking they’ll join up with the rest of the herd. This was mostly a smooth process, except for the one-week-old calf that refused to cross the little brook and ran the opposite direction and back to the field we’d just moved them all from. It took some doing - and a van - to catch him and get him into the same field as his mom.

We ate dinner together — there were seven of us including two of Jonathan and Nina’s children — which was nice. I really like the fact that group meals are a central part of the day. The fact that all the food was really good helps too. And that’s not even mentioning the bread and cheese which accompany pretty much everything.

After dinner, I helped Jonathan round up some chickens to move to a more secure room in the coop. This was pretty funny for me…I don’t think I’ve ever handled live chickens before and I was surprised at how fast some of them could run — especially the little grey with white speckled birds. Moving them is an attempt to thwart a chicken killer who has been breaking into the coop every night for the past couple of weeks and killing indiscriminately. We’ll see tomorrow how well this works. Apparently, about half the chicken population has been killed in the past two weeks. No one’s really sure what’s doing it, thought the speculation is cats or weasels.

So far, so good. I know it’s only day one, but I get the feeling this is going to work out pretty well. I’m really looking forward to the rest of the summer.

From failing farm to big cheese
Allentown Morning Call - Allentown,PA,USA

116 cheese plants produce 2.2 billion pounds of cheese annually
Monroe Times - Monroe,WI,USA

Today’s the day…in an hour or so I’ll be heading out from our apartment in Brooklyn on my way to Bobolink Dairy. Oddly, I’m not really nervous at all. I’m sure that will change as I pull up to the farm, though. I hope to post tonight with my thoughts on the first day, but I’m not sure what my internet situation will be like yet.

I spoke to Jonathan yesterday, and he tells me that there’s a lot to do today. I guess I’ll be put to work right away.

Cheese fest menu offers a full plate
Seattle Times - Seattle,WA,USA

DeLaurenti hosts first Seattle Cheese Festival this weekend
Seattle Post Intelligencer - Seattle,WA,USA

Big cheese rules on feta
Guardian Unlimited - UK

America Says Cheese
Creative Loafing Charlotte - Charlotte,NC,USA

Homey mac and cheese an American standard
Monterey County Herald - Monterey,CA,USA

Say mac ‘n’ cheese, please
Akron Beacon Journal - Akron,OH,USA (free signup required)

Ok…archives are now working with the new look-and-feel. There’re still a few odds and ends to take care of, but nothing major.

I’ve added categories to my posts (names might change as I’m not entirely happy with any of them). One of the new categories is “cheese news and links” in which I plan on posting any interesting cheese news I come across. So in addition to cheesebiz being your place to keep track of what I’m up to, it’ll become a place to keep track of the world of cheese in general. If you come across an interesting cheese news item, please send it my way.

As you might have noticed, things are changing around here. In preparation for the big move out to the farm, we’ve redesigned the site. For the next day or two, things might be a little messed up. Right now, only the main page has been updated. The archives and comments don’t have the new look-and-feel. Don’t fret, though, all will be updated soon. There will also be some new site features, so be on the lookout.