Cutting the Curd
Cheese R&D: Sugarhouse Creamery & Crown Finish Caves
The R&D process for creating a new cheese can be a long and expensive one for new artisan cheesemakers, but it is also a labor of love. On this week's episode of Cutting the Curd, host Greg Blais sits down Benton Brown and Sam Frank of the Crown Finish Caves - a cheese aging facility in Crown Heights, Brooklyn - and New York cheesemakers Margot Brooks of Sugar House Creamery and Jos Vulto of Vulto Creamery. While Sugar House ages most of their cheeses in a cave on their farm, they have also worked with Crown Finish to create some spectacular variations on the same small format cheese. Tune in to hear about what it takes to make new and exciting cheeses, and how cheese friendships and community support the R&D process. This program has been brought to you by The Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board.
"We knew we wanted to do the cave age process. We really like that part of the cheesemaking process. We are very passionate about that aspect of cheesemaking and we think it attributes a lot to the flavor of the farmstead cheeses." [6:30]
--Margot Brooks on Cutting the Curd
"I like the aging process, I think that's the most exciting part of the cheese making process... but there's no necessity to turn any of my cheeses over to an outside facility [to cave age]. That being said, if in the future I needed it, no, I would certainly do it." [28:50]
--Jos Vulto on Cutting the Curd