Idyll Farms

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Whew! We’ve been busy!

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.

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2017 Holiday Greetings

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!

Winter 2017

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

eliultrasoundThis 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.

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

Autumn Pastures Make Delectable Goat Cheese

Goats In Fall PasturesIt’s been a glorious autumn for getting out to the pastures and our fall milk is better than ever! Breeding season is in full swing and we should be expecting up to 400 new kids starting in January. We are gearing up for a full barn- the joint will be jumping! Our distribution is branching throughout the midwest and spilling out across the country. If you don’t see Idyll Farms in your favorite cheese shop, please ask for it! The cheesemonger can always look us up and we are happy to send out samples their way. We are also on the verge of an exciting new packaging system for our fresh chèvre in tub (which will be renamed “Spreadable Idyll Pastures”) as well as our Idyll Pastures. This new packaging will extend these products significantly and we will be able to distribute it more widely. Stay tuned for launch dates!

 

Make sure to check out our Idyll Gris, featured in Culture Magazine’s Best Cheeses of the Year!

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A Gold, Silver and Bronze at the 2016 World Championship Cheese Contest for Idyll Farms!

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We have had a busy couple of weeks! Our kidding season began March 10, with Detroit giving birth to a doeling, prompting us to offer a Idyll Farms Detroit t-shirt to the winning name for her kid (it needs to start with an “E”). Jury is still out on the winner. As of publish date, 48 kids have been born out of a possible 300 by the end of next month.

Jury has voted (in fact, an international panel of experts) on our cheese at the 2016 World Championship Cheese Contest! The World Championship Cheese Contest, initiated in 1957, is the largest technical cheese, butter, and yogurt competition in the world. A record-setting 2,959 cheese entries from 23 countries and 31 states were evaluated during the three- day competition in Madison, Wisconsin. Idyll Farms won “Best in Class” (Gold Medal) as well as a Silver Medal for our Idyll Gris in the Surface (Mold) Ripened Goat’s Milk Cheeses and a Bronze Medal for our newest product, Idyll Pastures with Garlic and Herbs, in the Flavored Soft Goat’s Milk Cheeses. Congrats to Team Idyll, headed up on the farm side by Leonard Pollara, for keeping our goats and pastures happy and healthy, giving us our beautiful milk for our cheese, and on the creamery side by our proven award-winning cheesemaker, Melissa Hiles, who has been the backbone of Idyll Farms operations since the farm’s inception.

Seasons Greetings Idyll Friends…

IMG_3896It’s been a glorious fall with fantastic weather for our Idyll goats to be on pasture! Our rotational grazing practices have made a remarkable difference in how prolific, rich and lush our pastures have become while providing an outstanding quality and array of forage. Using the portable electric fences has been key to tailoring each days’ grazing. This pasture improvement is transferred to the health and happiness of our goats, making their milk ideal for our farmstead cheeses to capture the unique terroir of Northport. Mating season is coming to a close. Our girls are on their last stretch of milking days until their pregnancy leave kicks in for January and February. We always let the herd rest to allow for the peak of success in kidding and doe health. We expect to have a very limited amount of our amazing aged cheeses during January, February and March. Once our does start kidding again in March we will be kicking off our 2016 fresh cheese season.
We have enjoyed making cheeses for you this year and are eager and looking forward to sharing another exciting flavorful spring with you in 2016!
In the mean while…

Give the gift of Northern Michigan’s terroir with Idyll Farms Holiday offerings-

We are now taking orders for our Holiday Boxes to stock up on chèvre to serve at your holiday celebrations or to send to your family and friends as a tasty gift from Northern Michigan that they can sink their teeth into!
Please email orders to: orders@idyllfarms.com NO LATER THAN December 10th, the last day we will be taking orders for December 25th delivery. Don’t forget about your New Year’s Eve celebration either!

Chèvre trio
Small box- $45 plus tax and shipping
Trio of Camembert, Mont Idyll, and Idyllweiss
approximately 17 oz

Chèvre and Cherries
Medium box- $75 plus tax and shipping
Trio of Camembert, Mont Idyll and Idyllweiss
Trio of Tart Cherry Preserve, Tart Cherry Butter, and Tart Cherries Foster

Chilling with Chèvre and Cherries
Large box- $100 plus tax and shipping
Trio of Camembert, Mont Idyll and Idyllweiss
Trio of Tart Cherry Preserve, Tart Cherry Butter, and Tart Cherries Foster
Idyll Farms Chill by FlexiFreeze collapsible cooler bag with re-freezable ice
Idyll Farms green embroidered baseball hat
Plus *free* bonus Idyll Farms plush toy goat

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