We are proud to announce we won 4 awards at the 2018 American Cheese Society Competition held in Pittsburgh a few weeks ago! This brings our ACS award count to 15 in addition to our 5 World Championship Cheese Contest Awards- our Michigan produced cheese is definitely a contender in the International Cheese Scene! Here are the details-

2nd place- Idyll Gris 1 lb
(BG) open category soft-ripened cheeses made from goat’s milk

2nd place- Ricotta
(AG) Cottage cheese, cream cheese, fromage blanc, fromage frais, mascarpone, quark, and ricotta made from goat’s milk

3rd place- Idyll Gris 3 lb
(NS) Fresh Goat’s milk cheese aged 0-30 days (hand-shaped, formed or molded into pyramid, disc, drum, crottin, basket or other shape

3rd place- Idyll Pastures Garlic and Herbs
(KN) Fresh goat cheese with flavor added- 100% goat’s milk (Note: this category had the most entries out of the entire competition)

We just completed our kidding season of “G” names (we assign a different letter of the alphabet each year). Starting with “A” names, this would bring us to our 7th official kidding season! We had a total of 320 kids born at Idyll Farms this year! We selected 10 bucklings, 60 doelings to keep and prepared a group of 30 wethers to donate to a grazing conservation project associated with the Leelanau Conservancy. http://leelanauconservancy.org/blog/2018/04/25/war-garlic-mustard-goats-volunteers-dumpsters/ (more on this to come!) The rest of the kids were sold to a farm raising goats for 4-H children.

In March, we won two 2018 World Championship Cheese Contest awards. Our Idyll Pastures Fennel Pollen won a “Best in Class” in the “Flavored Soft Goat Cheeses” category, and our Idyll Pastures plain won a 3rd place in the “Soft Goat Milk Cheeses” category. This brings our award count up to 5 World Championship Cheese Contest awards and 11 American Cheese Society awards just going into our 6th season making cheese!

Hope you can join us this summer at one of our tours! In the meantime, follow us on Instagram, @idyllfarmschevre, our Idyll Farms Facebook page or Twitter.

Check it out!

Award-Winning Cheese From Unexpected Farmers

As the days get shorter and cooler it comes to the time of year when Idyll goats start to “dry off” their milk production in preparation for their kidding (birthing) season in the spring. We allow them this period of rest for their health and the health of their babies. What this means to our cheese production is that our fresh cheeses periodically will not be available roughly between end of December throughout March. We will have a limited supply of our raw milk, washed rind Temptation during this time.

As far as holiday baskets are concerned, this year we are doing a la carte baskets for those that are interested. Check out the cheese section, let us know what cheese and amount you are interested, as well as any other merchandise, and we will get back to you with a price list and availability.

From our Great Lakes Pastures, wishing you green pastures this coming holiday and year!

http://www.crossroadstoday.com/story/36021238/idyll-farms-takes-home-seven-awards-at-2017-american-cheese-society-conference

January is a quieter time at Idyll Farms. Pregnant does are happily ruminating in their cozy barns. Our cheesemaker is readying her supplies for the coming cheesemake months, and our farmers getting a little well deserved rest from milking and preparing themselves for kidding season.   It’s a time to reflect on our past year and to look ahead to our goals for the coming year. In 2016 we produced roughly 14,500 lbs of  7 varieties of cheese!

Our accolades in 2016-
Idyll Gris- 1st and 2nd place at the World Championship Cheese contest
Idyll Gris named in Culture magazine’s “Best Cheeses of the Year” issue
Idyll Pastures- 3rd place World Championship Cheese Contest
Mont Idyll 3rd place at ACS
Mont Idyll named a “Best Artisanal Cheese” by Food and Wine Magazine

This kidding season, starting in February, we are expecting around 400 kids! We will be on the letter “F” for our kid names this year. Below is a picture of Eli operating our new ultrasound machine, which allows us to know which of our does were impregnated this year so that we can give them the proper care. It’s so exciting to see their little bodies developing in their mamas!

We are rolling out some new packaging this year for our Idyll Pastures and our Fresh Chèvre in Tubs (renaming it Idyll Spreadable Pastures) which will significantly extend the product’s shelf life, allowing us to distribute it in more grocery stores. Please ask our local cheesemonger/chef for us by name! We would love to be able to get our cheese in your local markets and restaurants.

Currently our only cheese available for sale until April is our Temptation.

TEMPTATION

Temptation is a raw milk tomme styled cheese. It ages in our state of the art cheese cellar for a minimum of 60 days, gracefully perched on specially aged kiln dried wood harvested during the last full moons of December. During the affinage process, it is hand washed daily with a hard cider made from Idyll Farms harvested apples. The end result is a semi-hard cheese with complex layers of length, nose, texture, and flavor going from mild to sharp as it ages.

Sizing: Large Wheel (7-9 lbs), Small Wheel (3-5 lbs), Cut to size