Inside the Cheese Facility
Our milk goes into a meticulously cleaned cheese facility where the water and air is cleaned by a system of black lights and filters.
Here Kelly Harding our Cheese Maker is seen “cutting the curds.” A calf actually can’t at first digests it’s mothers milk! There is rennet present in the calf’s’ stomach that curdles the milk basically turning into cheese…then the calf can digest it. We add a small amount of the enzyme rennet to the milk causing it to coagulate.
Then the curds are cut into different sizes depending on the cheese Kelly is making that day. Here Kelly is making Toma which requires a smaller curd size than say Buttercup brie. The Brie curds are cut so big that Kelly cuts them by hand, not with the blades you see here. The whey is then sent off to sustain the pigs!
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- Kelly cuts curd. Here Kelly is making Toma which requires a smaller curd size than our other high-quality cheeses.
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- These cut curds are ready to be molded into cheese wheels.
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- Curds are stacked vertically in molds to form their traditional “wheel” shape.
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- Our molded cheese wheels ready to be soaked in brine.
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- Cheese wheels soaking in brine.
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- Cheese Wheels Aging in Cherry Grove’s “Cave”
At this point the wheels go into our “caves” for aging.
