The "Cheese Enthusiast" (6issues/year) is building on the foundation of Home Dairy News and its support to the home cheesemaking community.
CE features in-depth articles on artisanal cheeses and how they can be made at home. As our appropriately anxious nation turns away from mass-produced factory food and looks more locally for healthy things to eat, to grow, and to make at home, CE will do its part to sustain and grow the local-dairy, farmersmarket, and home-made approach to life.
CE recognizes that those who make and/or love cheese are fascinated by how it is made and served. CE will therefore take a broad look at the cheese we love with features on the practices and interests of artisanal and farmstead cheese makers.
CE includes columns such as “The Urban Farmer,” looking at what small farmers bring into the city and suburbs and how city and suburban dwellers can support and enjoy the fruits of sustainable local agriculture. Also included are book and DVD reviews and reports on visits with farmers who have brought the “old ways” into our modern world. Each issue will put the spotlight on a particular cheese, looking into how and where it is made, and by whom, and who eats it and how. Regular interviews with home cheesemakers: how they got started, what they make (and don’t) and why, how they make and age their cheeses. Also included are informal discussions of common home cheesemaking mistakes, great disasters, and how to fix them, or at least considerations in renaming the end product (Julia Child once said that if a dish turns out to be a mess, but edible, just add the word “rustic” to the title).
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 14, 2008
Home Dairy News Evolves Into Cheese Enthusiast
Greetings fellow cheesemakers and cheese enthusiasts! We are excited to announce that after years of supporting home and artisanal cheesemakers and those interested in small-dairy operations in general, the spirit of Home Dairy News is continuing through the Cheese Enthusiast. As Vicki Dunaway has written, HDN was initially created to fill a vacuum for homesteaders and home cheesemakers. Vicki decided last year to suspend publication of HDN at the end of 2008 but has since handed over the torch to Susan Marquis, a subscriber, contributor, and urban cheesemaker who couldn’t stand to see The Home Dairy News come to such an abrupt end. Cheese Enthusiast will be coming from suburban Washington DC, where I (a regular contributor to Home Dairy News), have been making cheese at home for years. My husband Chris and I are lucky to be close to farmlands in the Shenandoah Valley, the Delmarva Peninsula, and Southern Pennsylvania, so we will be reporting on farm visits, regional and national agricultural and regulatory issues affecting the dairy and small-farm realm, and what we are seeing and not seeing in local farmers’ markets throughout the year.
Milk and its endproducts lie at the heart of American agriculture and at the center of our unfolding revolution in re-localizing our eating habits. We all want to eat right, and it’s hard to find anyone who doesn’t want local and regional farmlands sustained, even if just for nostalgic purposes. Agriculture is more than a way of life, it is a business, and Cheese Enthusiast hopes to help support those for whom local eating, and cheesemaking, and small dairy operating, are at least part of their way of life, for reasons of ethics, health, environment, and the pure pleasure of a home-made, raw-milk cheeses!
Although we are broadening the scope of our beloved Home Dairy News a bit, we will keep one foot firmly planted in the milk bucket at all times – even if that means living vicariously through HDN and Cheese Enthusiast subscribers who maintain the homesteading lifestyle. Milk and its end-products lie at the heart of American agriculture and at the center of our unfolding revolution in re-localizing (or at least regionalizing) our eating habits. At Cheese Enthusiast, we hope to help support those for whom local eating, and cheesemaking, and small dairy operating, are at least part of their way of life, for reasons of ethics, health, environment, and the pure pleasure of biting into a home-made, raw-milk Camembert.
Cheese Enthusiast welcomes the opportunity to support the cheesemaking community and to share it with those who share our love of homemade and traditional cheese and other dairy products. Join us through a subscription or as an advertiser. We look forward to hearing from you!
..... Susan Marquis