Nils Koster is one half of the duo Drijfhout, a music teacher, and an orchestra conductor. In his spare time he makes cheese out of milk and seaweed. About a year ago, after many experiments, he began selling Vlielandse seaweed cheese. Since August, his cheeses have been maturing in a World War II-era bunker. We wanted to know what that’s all about, so we gave the cheesemaker a call.
MUNCHIES: Hi, Nils. So, why do you make cheese with seaweed?
Nils Koster: I wanted to make real “islander cheese,” but we don’t have our own dairy cattle on the island. So I decided to add seaweed to my cheese. The milk isn’t from the island, but from Noorderland. I manually harvest the seaweed. Seaweed cheese is very healthy because there’s all kinds of good stuff in there. The iodine makes it hard to process into a cheese, though. Iodine doesn’t work with starter culture, so that’s a big problem when you’re making cheese. But after years of trying, cheesemaker Kaaslust from Veenhuizen and I finally succeeded. In Belgium, there’s someone making cheese with seaweed from Breton, but our cheese is exported to the US.
In America they eat cheese with Dutch seaweed?
That’s right. I think it’s funny they eat it over there, but I don’t hear too much about it. An importer buys my cheese and then it’s gone: out of sight, out of mind. I actually prefer organizing tastings, or being out on a market. I like being able to see people’s reactions, and to be able tell them more about the product.
To read the rest of the story, please go to: Vice / Muncies
