PHOTOGRAPHY & EDIT: Rebecca Goodpasture
GOAT CHEESE
At Winter Winds Farm with Nathan Ray
Victor, Idaho, USA
EDITOR'S NOTE
On the western side of the Tetons lies Winter Winds Farm, where a small herd of goats are tended to by cheesemaker Nathan Ray. Nathan makes four types of goat cheese. My favorite is the "Hotshot" applewood smoked chèvre, a charcuterie staple so good that it served as currency and, on more than one occasion, as a thank-you gift.
From spring to fall Nathan works nonstop. He milks the goats twice a day, he's at every farmers market, and his cheese is used in restaurants and sold in local stores. I learned a lot listening to Nathan and visiting his farm. Though the final product might be blissful, farming is exhausting and difficult. He was honest about the good and the bad, in raising animals and in having your own business, and I learned not to ask a craftsman to choose his favorite as he works hard and loves them all.
This piece is best enjoyed with a smoked chèvre and a glass of Carménère. Enjoy!
ON HIS START:
I was always amazed as a chef, the disconnect of food with people, not knowing where it came from.
I was a chef for a long time, I was on the food scene and just always loved cheese and was fascinated by it, and wanted to learn how to make it. So I moved to Oregon and got a job on a goat farm there, where I kind of did anything and everything. Learned the trade and worked there for three years for a guy and then moved here about 10 years ago. Within the first year we were looking to buy property, and 10 years later I’ve got my own goat farm.
We moved here and bought the property. And every year we did something else; first year we built our house, second year we fenced it, third year we built the barn and bought goats and so we’ve had goats on the property for about seven years now. Cheese facility was the fourth year, and every year was something. Now that it’s up and running, it’s just finding that happy medium of production to labor.
ALPINE vs NUBIAN:
"the milking goats"
We’ve got 48 (milking goats) this year. Mostly Nubians, the ones with the long floppy ears. There's a couple Alpines. Nubians, they produce the richest milk, good for cheese making. They don’t produce the most milk, but they produce really rich milk. So it makes good cheese.
A Nubian, named "Dueces"
THE SEASON:
They give birth in April, and I milk them from April through November and then they kinda hang out and be pregnant all winter and I ski, and back at it April through November.
You know it really is (seasonal), especially goats and sheep more so than cows, just because they’re more of a 6-month out of the year lactation than 12-months-out-of-the-year. But, with today’s society, people want the same stuff year round all the time, so they made it possible to milk year round: they start stagger breeding them more, to make it a little easier. But it is (hard on the goats), milking them year round, definitely strains them a little bit more. They definitely like their time off, and so do I!
THE PROCESS:
This is just a 50-gallon bulk tank pasteurizer, it’s where I make the cheese, process everything. Once it’s done processing it moves to the draining table. As you can see, those cheese are draining. Draining off, so basically separating the solids from the liquids.
So the harder aged cheeses are unpasteurized, because they’re aged over 60 days. The chèvres, the fresh cheeses, and the bries, because they’re not aged over 60 days, I pasteurize those. So the rule is, if you age it over 60 days it can be raw milk.
NATE EXPLAINS:
the three additives
They give birth, they lactate, and then you milk them. As far as the cheesemaking aspect, it’s just a fermentation science where you’re adding three ingredients: culture, enzyme, and salt to the milk.
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The culture is bacteria, and that’s what flavors and protects the milk from bad bacteria. That’s what grows and creates acidity in the milk and cheese.
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The enzyme is the rennet from the stomach of baby goats, and that’s what coagulates it, and that’s what’s really seperating the curd: the solids from the liquid.
Once you get to that point you just manipulate it in different ways depending on what cheese style. The more moisture you take out, the harder cheese it’s gonna be. The more moisture you leave in the softer the cheese will be.
3. Then you add salt and either age it or package it as fresh cheese.
The draining table.
TYPES OF CHEESE:
So I make four different kinds. Two more aged cheeses, one harder with a natural rind, which would be more like manchego, which is my tome. Then the other one is a gouda, the ones in the vacuum sealed bags; softer, milder, and you age them with something around them so they don’t dry out and don’t form a rind. The other kind would be chèvre, which is a fresh cheese. It’s just really soft, mild, and not aged at all, really creamy, kind of like a cream cheese. And then crottin, which is like a brie, it has introduced yeast and mold so it forms a bloomy rind on the outside. Then it ages and it gets a little soft and earthy and a little funky from the mold and yeast.
And those are the four kinds. And also I do one flavor of the chèvre, which is smoked in a little meat smoker. So just how you would meat or something but instead of hours for meat it’s 5-10 minutes. Just to get the flavor on it.
MANCHEGO: hard, aged cheese
CROTTIN: soft, earthy cheese
CLIMATE:
The weather definitely affects their milk. If it starts getting cold they’ll start producing less milk, but it’ll be much richer. They’ll just get really high in fat and proteins. So the volume of milk goes down, but my production in cheese will actually go up, because the milk is so rich.
It starts out that way, right after they kid it’s really rich. And you kinda think about it, if they’re feeding their babies they want really rich milk right at the beginning, and then they start producing more milk but less rich as they’re growing, and then going into the winter when it’s getting cold and they want to fatten their kids back up, their milk gets really rich again.
TOOL MARKS OF THE CRAFTSMAN:
Those big operations, they very much control their starting point, their milk. So they make sure their milk is the same every time. To whereas, my milk’s different every day. And I don’t test it for fat, protein, I just know the curve of the summer and can change my recipe to make the same cheese.
It makes it more art, because I have to know how everything is looking and feeling. Just feeling the curd as I’m making it, like, “oh, this must have more moisture in it than last time,” and knowing the animals and the season. More in tune than just testing the milk every time and manipulating it more. It is very seasonal, and people know products change and fluctuate, and they respect that. And that’s the joy of it, like “oo that one’s different than this one.” (Anna talks about craftsman comparisons in our Ritual Chocolate interview)
THE HOTSHOT:
a smoked chèvre
Fan favorite and stellar addition to any charcuterie. Pairs perfectly with roasted meat, a glass of Carménère, or straight from the package via tortilla chips.
NATHAN'S RECIPE:
Featuring: anaheim, poblano, or hatch peppers.
Char on grill and let steam in a plastic bag for about 5 minutes. Peel off charred skin and remove seeds. Slice hotshot chevre and put in peppers. Heat stuffed peppers back up on grill or in oven.
Season with salt, olive oil and a little lime.
Nathan, at Winter Winds Farm
Special thanks to Nikki Anderson.
Winter Winds Farm
Victor, Idaho, USA
winterwindsfarm.com
