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"Right now, we're cutting the curd a little smaller because winter
milk has more fat and protein," Molly says as she gently pushes
a white plastic shovel through the full vat. After stirring them by
hand, she attaches mechanical arms, which will further break
down the curds until they are just the right texture. "You have to
make seasonal changes in how you're making the cheese so that
the end product stays consistent." The smaller curds are cut, the
more liquid is released, which helps to give Oma—a washed rind
tome—its signature rich and creamy paste. She gives me a handful
of curds to taste—soft and velvety, they hint of the luscious cheese
they will become.
Molly joined Von Trapp Farmstead in 2013, after studying
cheesemaking at the University of Vermont's Institute for
Artisan Cheese and honing her chops with the cheesemakers
at Shelburne Farms and others. Sebastian von Trapp and his
brother Dan launched the creamery in 2009, using milk from
the herd kept by their parents, Kelly and Martin von Trapp. The
farm in Vermont's Mad River Valley has been in the family since
V
E R MON T winter is showing its true colors
when I pull into Von Trapp Farmstead in
Waitsfield on a late January Monday. A thick
blanket of clouds is broken here and there by bits of
blue. Outside the barn, cows from the farm's mix of
Normande, Montbeliarde, Ayrshire, and Jersey cows
are resting on hay spread over the heavy snowpack.
The peak of Mt. Alice rises behind them, purple/black
against the moled sky. Inside the small creamery,
Molly Semler stands on a platform stirring a vat
of pale-yellow curds for Oma, one of Von Trapp
Farmstead's four organic, cow's milk cheeses.
