Cheesemaking in Maine with Allison Lakin of Lakin's Gorges Cheese

Every cheesemaker needs a market for their product: a city where you can offer your wheels at farmers' markets, shops and restaurants that sell your products, distributors who truck them across the country. For Allison Lakin, cheesemaker and co-owner of Lakin's Gorges Cheese and East Forty Farm, running a small-scale creamery on the Maine coast means getting creative with how she reaches customers and markets her cheese. Stef and Sue talked with Allison about the challenges of selling and distributing cheese from the far northeast corner of the country, the ups and downs of running a scrappy little cheese business, her open and honest approach to social media, and how 2020 changed everything from her cheese offerings to her Cowside Supper events. 

LINKS: 

Learn more about Allison: Lakin's Gorges Cheese / Instagram

Startup Sheep Dairy with Megan Bogle of True North Farmstead

Do you daydream about running your own little cheesemaking operation? Megan Bogle of True North Farmstead in Downingtown, Pennsylvania is living that dream—but she and her husband didn't start out hoping to become dairy farmers.

Today, Megan raises a small flock of sheep for milk, meat, and fiber on just two acres in the Philly suburbs, making fresh cheeses during the growing season and experimenting with cow's milk sourced from a nearby dairy in the winter. Stef and Sue talk with Megan about the trials and tribulations of the startup creamery, why sheep's milk is so great for cheesemaking, and the power of mentorship and community in Southeast Pennsylvania's cheese culture. If you're a startup cheesemaker or have your own micro-dairy dreams, this episode is for you!

Learn more about Megan: True North Farmstead / Instagram

Mariana Marques de Almeida of Ms. J and Co.

The US has a huge appetite for sheep's milk cheese, but only around 1 percent of the sheep cheese we consume here comes from American creameries. A ban against importing high-quality dairy sheep genetics from Europe is a big reason why. Now that the ban has been lifted, sheep dairies are working to catch up. Stef and Sue interview Portuguese-born animal scientist, breeding advisor, and cheese specialist Mariana Marques de Almeida, who's leading the way on this exciting effort. 

Mariana is working to seriously level up sheep dairying in the US with Ms. J and Co., a large Wisconsin sheep dairy and breeding project she opened in 2015. She and her business partners hope that by making high-quality genetics from Spanish Assaf sheep available to farmers and selling great milk to existing sheep dairies, making sheep's milk cheese will become much more common here in the US than it has been. 

Learn more about Mariana: Ms. J and Co. / Instagram

Benita Kasbo of Kasbo's Market

What kind of cheese did you eat when you were young? For Benita Kasbo, Syrian-American cheesemaker and owner of Kasbo's Market, the answer is jibneh, a savory, meltable brined cheese her family made at home when she was growing up in New Jersey. These days, Benita makes it for her own family, infusing each block of curd with fruity and floral mahlab, a fragrant spice made from ground cherry stones—and, since launching her business in 2020, she's been selling it through select outlets in New York City and North Jersey.

In this interview, Benita shares her story and her mission to expand the definition of what cheese can be for the American palate with Stef and Sue.

Learn more about Benita and where to buy her jibneh at Kasbo's Market | Instagram

Charuth von Beuzekom of Dutch Girl Creamery

When Charuth von Beuzekom founded Dutch Girl Creamery outside Lincoln, Nebraska in the mid-2000s, there wasn't much in the way of educational resources for a beginning cheesemaker. Charuth shares the story of the grant-funded educational journey to cheesemaking locales around the world that got her started, her friendship with Sue (who was in a similar stage of her business around the same time), and how much her farm—and Nebraska's artisan cheesemaking scene—has changed in the past 20 years.

Sue and Stef also ask Charuth about her cheeses, like the award-winning Rosa Maria and Dolle Mina (named for her activist mother), learn about how she and her husband juggle vegetable farming and milking goats, and get the story on how a tragic fire at the farm and creamery in 2021 became an opportunity to reimagine Dutch Girl's farming, cheesemaking, and business operations to be sustainable in a new era. 

Links: 

The famous photo of Charuth's Dutch activist mother with the Dolle Minas: https://publichistory.humanities.uva.nl/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/origineel-1.jpeg (the words on their stomachs mean "my belly is my own")

More on Charuth & Dutch Girl Creamery: https://www.shadowbrk.com/

More on Sue & Birchrun Hills Farm: https://birchrunhillsfarm.com/

More on Stef & Valley Milkhouse: https://www.valleymilkhouse.com/

More on Alex: https://www.alexandrajones.net/

We're Back! New Episodes Drop Oct. 20

Sue, Stef, and Alex are back with more of the only podcast by cheesemakers, for cheesemakers! The new season drops Monday, Oct. 20, with new episodes released every 2 weeks. We're excited to share interviews with some of our favorite American artisan cheesemakers, including Molly Semler of Von Trapp Farmstead in Vermont, Charuth von Beuzekom of Dutch Girl Creamery in Nebraska, Allison Lakin of Lakin's Gorges Cheese in Maine, and more. We're talking about everything from homesteading to sheep genetics to immigrant cheese traditions to our favorite styles of feta, and we're so excited to share it all with you!

For more info: 

An Interview with Mark Gillman of Cato Corner Farm

mark-gillman-cato-corner.jpg

On today’s episode, the cheese dames chat with Mark Gillman, second-generation cheesemaker at Connecticut's Cato Corner Farm! Mark is one of the crew of cheesemakers collaborating on the Cornerstone Project, using an open-source recipe for making cheese with native cultures harvested from his own herd to best express the terroir of his farm. He’s also an award-winning cheesemaker — and his Bloomsday, a cheddar-esque washed rind wheel, is a featured guest cheese in Collective Creamery shares this coming week!

An Interview with Sean Fitzgerald of Cherry Grove Farm

Our cheesemakers spent this past weekend cruising through the farm fields of New England, gathering even more maker interviews for future episodes — so we’re busting this interview with Sean Fitzgerald of Cherry Grove Farm out of the archives! This episode is a perfect companion to our last ep featuring Sean’s co-cheesemaker Paul Lawler. We hope you enjoy!

For Pennsylvania folks: our Summer Cheese Share is now open! Find out more and sign up for a season of cheese with Collective Creamery here.

An Interview with Jessie Dowling of Fuzzy Udder Creamery

In this episode, the Cheese Dames look north to Maine, where a campaign for food sovereignty has made the state a haven for artisan cheesemakers. We sat down with Jessie Dowling of Fuzzy Udder Creamery discuss the opportunities and challenges Maine’s regulations around dairy and cheese — the most permissive in the country — have created for the state’s bustling cheesemaking community.

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