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the late 1950s, when Martin's parents, Erika and Werner von Trapp, known by their grandchildren as Oma and Opa, moved their six children to the property and began a dairy farming operation, which they maintained until 1979. (Werner, one of the famed Trapp Family Singers, was depicted in The Sound of Music as Kurt.) "Oma was a super advocate for continuing to farm and the cheese business," says Molly. "She used to joke, 'Why did you name a stinky cheese after me?'" Sebastian has joined her in the creamery and is preparing to mold his grandmother's namesake cheese. He opens a valve near the bottom of the vat, and a tube pumps curds into a metal tray atop a rack of round plastic molds. With his right on the valve, he uses his left hand to control the flow of curds, guiding them into the molds before moving the tray to another rack and continuing the process. (The whey, which drains into a trough underneath the racks will be used to feed the farmstead's pigs; the delicious pork is among the local products sold at the adjacent farm shop.) After sitting overnight, the cheeses will be loaded onto a cart and lowered through a hatch in the creamery floor to the basement We both had an urge to do something for ourselves and on the farm, and cheesemaking was something that made sense. It was a way to transform the family business and take it to the next generation. level, where they will be salt brined in a machine that Sebastian designed. Four days after Oma is made, it is shipped to the Cellars at Jasper Hill Farm—a little over 50 miles north—where it is aged for a total of 10 to 14 weeks. While the creamery employs four others, on Mondays, it's just Molly and Sebastian, their movements gracefully in sync amid the clatter of production. After Dan decided to move on from the cheesemaking operation, Marisa Mauro from nearby Ploughgate Creamery suggested that Sebastian reach out to Molly. The two eventually fell in love and are now partners in life—raising twin toddlers—as well as in cheese. "Molly and I becoming a couple is part of the reason why we're still in business," Sebastian says. "We do this together, and I don't know if I could do this on my own or would want to." They recently built a house in a corner of the farmland and are happily living a rural life that Sebastian thought he would leave behind. "Growing up I didn't think I'd have anything to do with the farm when I got older," he says. "I wanted to go off to college and get 56 culturecheesemag.com T R AV E L 202 2