OUR PROCESS
EXCEPTIONAL ARTISAN CHEESE
MADE IN COLORADO
ABOUT US
THE ART OF MAKING CHEESE
Like all great artists, we obsess over our process. We come to work everyday with a passion and dedication to excellence, purity, and traditional cheesemaking techniques to create beautiful, handcrafted, artisanal cheeses. With our cheesemaker Jackie Chang at the helm, every stage in the process requires the utmost care and attention to detail.
At Haystack Mountain Creamery, we are committed to crafting beautiful cheese that is pure and free of any preservatives and artificial flavors. That means our process requires much more dedication and artful craftsmanship. Everyday, we get to come to work and create artisanal cheeses, with traditional techniques, that everyone can enjoy. We truly love what we do!
GETTING STARTED
Someone turns on the music, and everyone starts limbering up, pulling on lab coats, rubber boots, hairnets. The room begins to buzz and so begins the Haystack art of dancing cheese. Production gears up, and everything begins to hum with a delicious energy. People’s hands are hard at work, doing what they love.
MAGIC MILK
We call it goat milk magic. We test and pump fresh goat milk into a 4,700-pound pasteurization tank. The vat heats up, bringing the milk to temperature. We add culture, testing for acidity when they begin to ripen. When the milk has set, we pull 700 pounds into a separate tank for tomorrow’s cheese-make of Peak and Snowdrop. We’ll use the remaining curd for fresh chèvre.
HARD AT WORK
Everyone comes in early. Curd for fresh chèvre is scooped from each tank and acidity-tested. Two cheesemakers pull the curd from the tank to drain, get turned, and drain again. A cheesemaker scoops surface-ripened curd to drain until the moisture’s perfect. Haystack Peak curd is ladled into its famous pyramid shape, while Snowdrop curd settles into a round mold. The cheesemaker returns to spin the chèvre.
EARLY AGAIN
Turning and twisting chèvre curd is the task at hand. Everyone arrives early to spin the curd into a brown basket, then roll it into the process cooler before it’s formed into chèvre logs. We turn the Peaks and Snowdrops, salt them, and place them in the aging room. They’ll ripen for weeks before being hand-wrapped and distributed.
READY TO ROLL
On the fourth day, our chèvre is ready to be shot into 4-ounce and 8-ounce logs and gently rolled into various herbs and spices. Cheese lingo? Call it shooting the logs. Once packaged, Haystack Mountain chèvre logs are picked up by Colorado distributors and shipped, air freight, to markets throughout the U.S. We personally deliver a portion to more than 80 Denver and Boulder restaurants.