FAQ

What are your hours?

Our winter hours are Monday to Friday 8:30am to 4:00pm. We are closed Saturdays. Hours will vary during the Christmas season.



Do you deliver to residential areas?

At this time we do not deliver to residential areas, therefore you would need to come to the store and pick up your order. If you are unable to pick up we can arrange an outside delivery service to deliver to your home at an additional cost. Please contact us to arrange this.

 

Do you ever sell cheese older than 5 years old?
We normally have 5 year cheddar year round, between November and December we usually offer older cheese, 8-11 years depending upon their availability. It’s normally a limited amount offered to each person. We always announce it on social media or you can call and inquire about it.
Why is some cheddar cheese orange and some white?

The simple answer is orange colouring is added to the cheese to make the cheddar a consistent colour.

The colouring dye is a natural food colouring agent that is derived from the seed pods of the achiote tree (Bixa Orellana) of South America. It is a natural colouring source that is basically odourless and tasteless. The fruit of the achiote tree has a smell of nutmeg, sweet and pepper. Once processed, minute amounts of the potent colour are added to milk in the cheese making process to colour it orange.

White cheddar is exactly the same as orange, minus the colouring.

 

Why orange?

Again in England, where the origins of cheddar can be traced, the grasslands and fields of the English countryside were high in plants that contained beta-carotene. Once eaten by dairy cattle, like Jersey and Guernsey cows, the milk they produced had a yellowish quality.

Depending on what they were eating, if would effect the colour of the milk through the year. These colour changes would be most notable when the transitions in feed from silage to fresh pasture and back, would occur. In order to keep the golden straw, slightly orange colour consistent as factory made cheddar became popular, colour was added.

 

Why colour cheddar at all?

There are arguments on both sides of the colouring fence, but manufacturers can agree on this. In the early days of manufacture when farmhouse cheddar production was a staple, the colour in cheddar was seen as a mark of quality, and over time built a reputation that became tradition.

Early cheesemakers would skim the cream and use the fatty richness for other products like butter. With this most desirable part of the milk reduced, so was the colour. Devious cheesemakers would add other ingredients to colour the cheese, like carrots, saffron or marigolds, to try to deepen the colour. This lower quality, reduced milk fat, and flavour changed cheddar would try to be passed off as high-grade cheddar.

 

What is the difference between heat treated and pasteurized cheese?

The simple answer is temperature of the milk during the cheese making process.

Both heat treated and pasteurized cheese are processes of cheese manufacturing that are considered traditional production. The third process is called raw milk.

Raw milk runs the coolest, then heat treat, and finally pasteurized is the warmest.

 

Why is milk heated?

Basically to rid the milk of the naturally occurring bacteria that is common to milk that could be harmful for consumption. Also by heating the milk in this fashion, it increases its longevity.

The problem with heating milk is it also kills off the “good bacteria”. That is the bacteria that makes the cheddar cheese have its distinctive sharp flavour as it ages. Therefore the closer we get to pasteurization, which kills the majority of all bacteria in milk, the less good bacteria these is to make that flavour.

 

Will pasteurized cheese age?

It will age, but it will not have the same flavour characteristics we have come to expect from cheese made from cooler process temperatures.

 

What are the little crystals in the cheese?

As cheeses like cheddar age, calcium, and lactic acid merge to form calcium lactate crystals. This natural process occurs in other cheese like parmesan or gouda. These crystals are generally considered a mark of a finely manufactured and aged cheese. They say that the cheddar will have extravagant hearty flavours that are very complex and desirable.