The Art of Cheese

Cheese. Wonderful, delightful cheese. Americans produce and eat more cheese than any other nation. Its versatility is undeniable. A simple tray of cheese set out prior to eating transforms a meal into a party. Melted over vegetables, it turns picky children into connoisseurs. Served at the end of a meal it can elicit wonder and awe—a pre-postprandial indulgence. Yet, some cheese does disappoint. Once the providence of artisanal craftsman, cheese entered the mainstream years ago. Bricks and slices inhabit miles of space in grocery stores around the country. It is a testament to our love of cheese—any cheese—that such a sight exists. If you’ve ever had a bite of truly artisanal cheese, you know that it satisfies on a different plane than the mass produced “wall of cheese” in your local supermarket. At Beyond Organic, we don’t love cheese. We love great cheese. Our decision to craft cheese was a natural one, but it was not an easy one. A commitment to great cheese is a commitment to travelling back in time. The two most important ingredients today are the same as they were 2,000 years ago—great milk and lots of time. Mass produced cheese rarely uses either—and the proof is in the flavor.

The Art In Artisanal

A great sculptor can take a simple piece of bronze and shape it into art. Cheese making is a similarly transformative process. It requires taking a precious ingredient—raw, whole milk—and using artistic craftsmanship applied over time, creating a product that is fundamentally different than the milk that you started with. It is a process that is best described as art—hence, the term artisanal.

At Beyond Organic, our cheese starts with one of our most precious resources—our milk. Much like cheese, the startling majority of milk consumed in the United States is mass produced. It’s hard to create great art with factory farm milk. Our milk comes from GreenFed™ cows allowed to freely roam green pastures, sampling from Nature’s buffet. The grass, herbs, forbs and legumes they eat are their natural diet—what cows have been consuming for thousands of years.

The milk these cows produce is unparalleled in both health benefits and flavor. It has a healthy ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 fattty acids. It has vitamin E and beta carotene. Our GreenFed dairy also contains conjugated linolenic acid (CLA)— a fatty acid that has been the subject of a substantial amount of research over the last several years. Our cows are never given antibiotics or growth hormones, and the land they graze is certified organic and is never sprayed with chemicals. The milk is rich and creamy, and it tastes unlike any milk found in supermarkets today. If milk can be artisanal, ours is. It’s also the ideal starting point for a great cheese. From there, our artisanal cheese maker takes over. The milk is allowed to settle, with the whey rising to the top and the curd remaining on the bottom. The whey—liquid gold in its own right—is siphoned off, cultures are added and the curd is pressed into wheel-shaped molds. The cultures will dominate the aging process and determine the type of cheese created.

The above description is overly simplistic. There are variables that only God controls and that is the true art of cheese making. Our cows’ diets change throughout the year—different greens grow at different times of the year. Milk taken from the cows in January may have slight taste differences than milk taken in August—subtly changing the end product of the cheese. Additionally, we never pasteurize our milk—it is never heated above cow body temperature (around 101.5° Fahrenheit). This is what we refer to as Really Raw. Mass producers of cheese love pasteurized milk because it delivers a uniform flavor and texture every time. Finally, how long you age the cheese will also affect the end result. Our cheese is ready when it’s ready—and that is exactly the way we want it.

Those variables are anathema to the factories that mass produce cheese. They want their cheese to taste exactly the same every day of the year. That is why they ultra-heat pasteurize the milk and age the cheese the exact same way every time. At Beyond Organic, that will never be our goal. If our cheese tastes different from batch to batch, then we know we are practicing the art of cheese making. Taste is subjective, and you may prefer one batch to another, but the cheese will always be great.

Art You Can Eat

Cheddar cheese is perhaps the most ubiquitous of cheeses. It is the most populous inhabitant of the aforementioned "wall of cheese." Unfortunately, the insipid flavor and texture of mass-produced cheddar cheese comically undervalues the true greatness of cheddar. This is a particular shame. True cheddar cheese (the name is derived from cheddar’s origin, the English village of Cheddar in Somerset) was once described by the "father of Cheddar cheese," Joseph Harding, as "close and firm in texture, yet mellow in character or quality; it is rich with a tendency to melt in the mouth, the flavour full and fine. . ." That hardly seems like the description one would use to describe run-of-the-mill mass-produced cheddar cheese.

Beyond Organic Raw Cheddar is what artisanal cheese is supposed to be. It is pleasingly sharp, with a crumbly texture, and a richness and complexity of flavor that can be found only in a raw milk, aged cheese. Once you taste the flavor and experience the health benefits, you’ll find it hard to go back to the processed cheddar so prevalent in stores today.

Beyond Organic Raw Havarti is an altogether different cheese. Havarti is a Danish cheese that first came to be in the mid-1800s. Much like cheddar cheese, what once started out as a uniquely artisanal tradition has been forsaken in the name of commerce. Originally, havarti cheese was made from raw milk. Today, much of the havarti that you find is known as "cream havarti." It uses highly pasteurized milk and is barely aged. It doesn’t compare in craftsmanship, texture or flavor to the original.

Our Raw Havarti is aged to create a pliable, semi-soft texture. It has a rich, almost buttery flavor with just a hint of tanginess. It is also versatile—great sliced and wonderful toasted or melted, where the buttery flavor becomes even more pronounced. It is the mildest of our cheeses and a great entry into the world of artisanal cheese making.

It has been said, "Art is to be consumed." Never has that phrase been more applicable than with Beyond Organic Raw Cheeses.