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4 books match the query 'Cheese'

cover of Beer, Brats, and Cheese: A Wisconsin Road Trip

Beer, Brats, and Cheese

A Wisconsin Road Trip

Heather Kerrigan

University of Wisconsin Press, 2025

Although Wisconsin foodways contain much more than beer, brats, and cheese, these remain at the pinnacle of the state’s fame—and rightly so. If you live in Wisconsin—or have simply visited—you know it’s hard to imagine tailgating, graduating, or celebrating without the Big Three.

To thoroughly research this book, Heather Kerrigan undertook a twenty-six-hundred-mile road trip crisscrossing the Badger State, seeking the hidden gems that locals frequent. She visited Wisconsin’s best restaurants, creameries, breweries, butcher shops, and cheesemongers. In Beer, Brats, and Cheese, Kerrigan highlights the innovative flavors and unexpected delights found in these spots. Great beer isn’t made only in Milwaukee, Sheboygan doesn’t have a lock on the best bratwurst, and excellent cheeses don’t just come from Monroe County. In fact, there are towns large and small, from the far north to the Illinois border, from Door County to the Mississippi River, that contribute to the state’s amazing culinary experiences. 

Whether you’re planning a bite-by-bite day trip or simply looking for a great place to eat or drink near home, this guide has you covered.
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cover of Cheese: The Making of a Wisconsin Tradition

Cheese

The Making of a Wisconsin Tradition

Jerry Apps

University of Wisconsin Press, 2020

Wisconsin has not always been the dairy state, but cheese is a notable part of its heritage. Capturing the voices of farmers, milk haulers, makers, and graders, Jerry Apps provides a rich view into the history of cheese in the state, beginning with its humble origins in farmhouse kitchens. As he explores the extraordinary diversity of cheese products, he peppers his lively narrative with obscure lore.

In this updated edition of a classic, Apps examines tumultuous changes in the business over the past twenty years, including the impacts of corporate megafarms and the rise of artisanal producers. Vivid historical photographs and striking portraits of modern family-operated factories reveal the delicate balance between art and science that goes into the process of turning ordinary milk into a wide variety of flavors, from the ubiquitous cheddar to sublime delicacies. Through these stories, we can come to better appreciate the remarkable farmers and producers that shaped cheesemaking into the thriving industry it is today.
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cover of Pacific Northwest Cheese: A History

Pacific Northwest Cheese

A History

Tami Parr

Oregon State University Press, 2013

In this rich and engaging history, Tami Parr shows how regional cheesemaking found its way back to the farm. It’s a lively story that begins with the first fur traders in the Pacific Northwest and ends with modern-day small farmers in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho.

For years, farmers in the Pacific Northwest made and sold cheese to support themselves, but over time the craft of cheesemaking became a profitable industry and production was consolidated into larger companies and cooperatives. Eventually, few individual cheesemakers were left in the region. In the late sixties and early seventies, influenced by the counterculture and back-to-the-land movements, the number of small farms and cheesemakers began to grow, initiating an artisan cheese renaissance that continues today.

Along with documenting the history of cheese in the region, Parr reveals some of the Pacific Northwest’s untold cheese stories: the fresh cheese made on the Oregon Trail, the region’s thriving blue cheese and regional swiss cheese makers, and the rise of goat’s milk and goat’s milk cheese (not the modern phenomenon many assume it to be).
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cover of The Master Cheesemakers of Wisconsin

The Master Cheesemakers of Wisconsin

James Norton and Becca Dilley

University of Wisconsin Press, 2009

This book—beautifully photographed and engagingly written—introduces hardworking, resourceful men and women who represent an artisanal craft that has roots in Europe but has been a Wisconsin tradition since the 1850s. Wisconsin produces more than 600 varieties of cheese, from massive wheels of cheddar and swiss to bricks of brick and limburger, to such specialties as crescenza-stracchino and juustoleipa. These masters combine tradition, technology, artistry, and years of dedicated learning—in a profession that depends on fickle, living ingredients—to create the rich tastes and beautiful presentation of their skillfully crafted products.
    Certification as a Master Cheesemaker typically takes almost fifteen years. An applicant must hold a cheesemaking license for at least ten years, create one or two chosen varieties of cheese for at least five years, take more than two years of university courses, consent to constant testing of their cheese and evaluation of their plant, and pass grueling oral and written exams to be awarded the prestigious title.
    James Norton and Becca Dilley interviewed these dairy artisans, listened to their stories, tasted their cheeses, and explored the plants where they work. They offer here profiles of forty-three active Master Cheesemakers of Wisconsin, as well as a glossary of cheesemaking terms, suggestions of operations that welcome visitors for tours, tasting notes and suggested food pairings, and tasty nuggets (shall we say curds?) of information on everything to do with cheese.
 
 
Winner, Best Midwest Regional Interest Book, Midwest Book Awards
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