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Our Cheeses Valley Shepherd Cheeses are all farmstead and artisan products made right here on the farm in Morris County, New Jersey. All our sheep's milk is produced by the hundreds of ewes that reside right here on the farm! See also: |
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In the Beginning ...
Because we do not use any hormones or antibiotics during the milking season, the sheep are rotated to fresh pastures every few days. Twice a day the ewes are called to the rotary milking parlor, and at a rate of 300 per hour, they are milked and returned to the pastures. For hundreds of years, cheese makers worldwide have been practicing this art as can be seen from this Dutch painted tile tray rendition of the traditional farm-made cow cheese [photo left]. You can see mom cutting the curd in the traditional wood vat while the previous batch is in the two-stamp press (we use the same press.) The cat licking the whey leaking from the other press and the equipment strewn about would not impress a modern-day dairy inspector! Steps of the Cheese making process ...
The wheels are moved to the cave, placed them on Ash wood shelves and aged for the next 3-12 months. They are turned, brushed, rubbed, washed, monitored and generally babied until ready. We have developed a series of cartoon art posters (hanging in our Viewing Gallery) that illustrate the cheese making process to school children who visit Valley Shepherd Creamery. The cheese making story is told from the perspective of little lactic bacteria and mice who are anxiously awaiting the finished product.
See these Cheese Making Posters online in a slide show. Our Cheese-Aging Cave Traditionally, cheese was aged in caverns and abbey dungeons. We recreated a traditional aging atmosphere by blasting 150 feet into the side of a hill on our farm. We constructed a cavern with 12-inch thick concrete floors, walls and ceilings which ended up being 100 feet long by 25 feet wide. The ‘cave’ is almost 20 feet underground at the far end, and it is divided into several aging rooms: hard cheese, blue, soft ripened, washed rind and brine/nursery rooms. This cave with its viewing gallery is part of our Fall Harvest Tour (Sep-Dec.)  We make many types of cheese [Go to: Types of Cheeses] and not all types are available all the time. The greatest variety can be found at out Sheep Shoppe where one can taste and purchase freshly cut chunks of anything we have out. We also bring several cheeses and cut to order at several farmers markets that we attend in New York City and New Jersey locations. We sell many of our cheeses and yogurt via [Go to: web commerce site]. In addition to the list below, watch the front page of our website for our weekly market locations. Farmers Markets: Wednesday all day, April to December - Union Square, NYC Cheese Shops & Restaurants:
—Too many to list...We are shipping a few of our 20 cheeses to lots of shops and restaurants: A note about buying on the web:
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After getting the newborns started on their mother's colostrum,
the lambs are moved and raised in our lamb greenhouse. Then the milking season
starts in earnest for the ewes.
