This valentine dessert is about the romance of local food — honestly wonderful local food as creamy, cultured and full of integrity as a cheese from a Burgundy farmhouse.
Cloumage comes in a carton. It’s a cultured fresh cheese that has the yeastiness of champagne and the fresh smoothness of creme fraiche. It’s sold at Whole Foods, and better grocery stores and cheese shops, but it’s created in Westport.
Once the greatest dairy producer in Massachusetts, Westport has struggled against modern economics to preserve farm land. About five years ago, the Santos family, a third-generation Westport milk-producer, was forced to admit their accounting’s steep slope downhill. The sons — two sets of twin brothers, one set 53 years old, the other just turned 51 — wanted to only do what they had been doing since they were kids, take care of their cows. With the help of Barbara Hanley, who guided the dairy into cheese making, the brothers are doing just that: Norman milks the cows. Arthur feeds them. Kevin runs the machinery, and now Karl, who is famous for fact-keeping, makes the cheese.
To read the rest of the story, please go to: Gloucester Times
