Oser Communications Group

GOURMET NEWS DECEMBER 2016 www.gourmetnews.com YEAR IN REVIEW 1 8 A Guided Tour Through Wisconsin's Dairyland BY LORRIE BAUMANN This story originally ran as a two-part story in the May and June 2016 issues of Gourmet News. Here we present it in its entirety. Please note that a couple of the people mentioned here have moved on from the positions de- scribed in this story in the intervening time. Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker Myron Olson runs the only cheese plant in the United States that's still making Limburger cheese. Olson is very nearly that unique himself – he's only one of 60 master cheese- makers in the only state in the U.S. that re- quires professional cheesemakers to be licensed, which is just a first step in becom- ing a certified Master. Requirements also include 10 years of on-the-job experience and a three-year course of study on a spe- cific variety of cheese. There's a 50-hour practical examination between school and certification. That's five-oh – I checked. It's rigorous. Periodic recertification is required, and that means periodic inspections to ensure that once the cheesemaker has been certi- fied as a master, he can't become compla- cent and let the standard drop in any way. Certifying as a Master Cheesemaker for an- other cheese requires another three-year course of study and another examination. Only 10 cheesemakers from across the state are eligible to start the Master Cheesemaker program each year, and there's a waiting list for entry. Among this Old School Wisconsin elite, Olson is one of the Old Schooliest. He's the only Master Cheesemaker in the U.S. who's certified for Limburger cheese. Famous for being the stinkiest of the stinky cheeses, with a natural aroma that's often compared to sweaty gym socks, Lim- burger's appeal among Americans today is generally limited to the adventurous eaters who enjoy a challenge, but it was once a very popular cheese among the German immigrants who settled in the Upper Mid- west. In the late 19th and early 20th cen- turies, Chalet Cheese Co-op was one of retailers, news that was causing heartburn across Wisconsin to customers who'd been loving the cheese before it got famous. The wheel that's sitting in Emmi Roth's test kitchen is a majestic maroon, and while you might think that a world champi- onship cheese would be as snooty as the high school quarterback who just threw 38 yards for the game-winning touchdown at homecoming, Grand Cru Surchoix is actu- ally the class good-time girl – you're more likely to get your hands on her if you've got some cash in your pockets, but you don't regret the expense because underneath that gorgeous rind, she's creamy and pliant and tastes a little like orange blossoms. Like Surchoix, Emmi Roth has an Old World heritage and some New World moxie. Oswald Roth started making cheese in Switzerland by 1863. His son, Otto, came to the U.S. in 1911, and the family eventually founded Roth Käse in the rolling hills of Wisconsin to make cheese from locally-sourced milk obtained from family farmers. In 2009, Roth Käse was ac- quired by the Switzerland cheesemaker and milk processor Emmi Group and now offers Emmi's range of traditional Swiss va- rieties as well as the American Originals originally made by Roth Käse. It's the clover and prairie grasses in the lush Wis- consin pastures that are responsible for the rich, complex flavors of the Roth cheeses, Jaeckle said. "Access to the highest quality milk is vital in making award-winning cheese," she said. Emmi Roth operates two plants and makes more than 50 varieties. The Monroe, Wisconsin, plant we visited employs 65 people who make 15 to 20 va- rieties from 350,000 pounds of milk a year, processing cheese from 10 p.m. at night five or six days a week until cheesemaking is done for the day at about 2 p.m., when the plant gets a final cleanup and then a lit- tle rest until work starts all over again the next day. The plant also uses four robotic assistants that wash the cheeses tirelessly many American makers of Limburger cheese that turned out millions of pounds of cheese a year and sold it as a sandwich cheese for working men. "Now we make 600,000 pounds of Limburger, and that's enough to satisfy everybody," Olson said. "Ours, it smells barny, but it's not like the days when you were in high school and had a gym locker…. All those things you've heard about how Limburger smells are true. If you put a piece in the refrigerator, next time you open it, you'll know it's there." As Americans' tastes in cheese have changed over the years, Chalet Cheese Co- op and its 19 employees have turned to making specialty cheeses that appeal to modern tastes, using the milk from 19 co- op member farms – 100,000-pounds each day – to make critically regarded Baby Swiss along with that 600,000 pounds of Limburger, 40-pound full-fat Swiss blocks and a few different styles of Brick cheese under its Country Castle and Dep- peler's brands as well as private labels for other Limburger cheese vendors. The farmers co-op was started in 1885 by five farmers who started out making Swiss cheese in Green County, Wis- consin, known as the state's Little Switzerland, but soon changed to Lim- burger as a way to compete better with the 200 other cheese factories also making Limburger and Swiss cheese in the area, Olson said. From the start, the plants in Green County were turning out Swiss cheese for the industry until Kraft's requirements for its Swiss cheese conflicted with Wisconsin's state laws defining the identity for Swiss. Kraft wanted its Swiss cheese formed in blocks; Wisconsin law required wheels. Kraft took its Swiss cheese contracts else- where. "Kraft went to other states. Wiscon- sin here, we didn't listen to the customer, so we lost the business," Olson said. "You may think it's the best cheese, but if your customer doesn't want it, it goes down…. You have to listen to what the customer wants – that's the whole thing." Chalet Cheese turned to making Baby Swiss, which didn't have a Wisconsin stan- dard, in the late 1970s to make up the de- creasing demand for Limburger. Today, Olson is only the creamery's third plant manager since the 1930s, and he and his team are processing 140,000 pounds of milk a day to make cheese five days a week, starting at about 2:00 in the morning and finishing by about 3:00 in the afternoon, and he's adamant that Chalet Cheese Co- op is dedicated to making cheeses that meet and exceed both its customers' expec- tations and the needs of the market. "Our Baby Swiss wins awards and is the best Baby Swiss in the world," he said. Indeed, the list of Chalet Cheese Co-op's awards fills a single-spaced page topped by the company's Best of Class award from the Wisconsin Cheese Makers Association's 2016 World Cheese Championship Contest for its 40-pound Baby Swiss block made by Mike Nelson. The Country Castle Baby Swiss is firm, a little chewy with a sweet nutty flavor. Chalet makes its Baby Swiss with full fat (whole) milk and cheese cultures that allow the cheese to keep its natural sweet- ness for five to six months. Eyes are well developed, plentiful, and kept at about thumb-size to please customers who prefer a cheese that can be sliced by high-speed equipment into slices with consistent weight, according to Olson. "With the extra fat, it really goes good on hash browns," he said. "Ours is one of the unique ones be- cause full fat gives it such a creamy mouth feel." I visited Chalet Cheese Co-op as part of a media tour sponsored by the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board, which is funded by dairy check-off fees mandated by federal law. Under that law, cow dairies pay a 15- cent tax on each hundred pounds of milk they produce. Of that, a dime comes back to Wisconsin to be used for dairy research and promotion. WMMB uses some of that money to host frequent tours for retailers and distributors who take the time to come and see how the cheese they sell is made, said Heather Porter Engwall, the organiza- tion's Director of National Product Com- munications. She stood aside as our group of food editors from national magazines and online portals from across the country filed out of the creamery into a chilly Wisconsin spring and onto a tour bus for a trip down two-lane county roads that wound between rolling hills furred with the stubble of last season's hay and silage crops to Emmi Roth, where Kirsten Jaeckle, Emmi Roth's Market- ing Manager and a member of its founding family, and corporate chef Claire Menck waited with a lunch that in- cluded the chance to taste the Emmi Roth Grand Cru Surchoix that just won the 2016 World Champion award from the WCMA. Behind us, Olson waved us off with, "Help yourself to cheese. We've got plenty of it." Emmi Roth, on the other hand, has al- ready sold out that championship Grand Cru Surchoix, much of it to a few specialty Continued on PAGE 19 MYRON OLSON KIRSTEN JAECKLE

• Cover