'The idyllic dairy farm': Chapel Hill Creamery cultures high-quality cheese

The award-winning Chapel Hill Creamery was founded in 2001 when Portia McKnight and Flo Hawley decided to pursue their love for cheese and buy nine Jersey cows.  

McKnight and Hawley’s journey began many years before, at Wellspring grocery, where they both worked in cheese retail. They both loved cheese and decided they wanted to move over to the production side of things in Chapel Hill. Two years before founding Chapel Hill Creamery, they immersed themselves in cheesemaking through classes, apprenticeships and experimentation, all the while refining their business plan. To say the least, cheese has been a defining factor of McKnight and Hawley’s lives. 

McKnight said that all her hard work has paid off, on a good day at least.

“[At the beginning], I milked cows seven days a week and did almost all the farm work and some cheese work,” McKnight said. “We worked long days.”  

Chapel Hill Creamery crafts many types of cheeses and sells locally at farmers' markets, Weaver Street Market and local restaurants like Acme and Carolina Brewery. 

During the process of learning cheesemaking, McKnight and Hawley realized that it would be best to own cows rather than buying milk. They bought Jersey Cows, which are smaller brown cows, because of the high butterfat content their milk has, as well as their heat resistance and fertility, which is important for the future of a small dairy operation. More baby cows means more milk in the long term. Jersey cows don’t produce as much milk as other breeds, such as Holstein cows, the black and white cows, but their milk is generally considered higher quality. 

Part of what makes Chapel Hill Creamery “award-winning” is starting with good milk, which comes from cows that are taken care of. The Chapel Hill Creamery cows are kept in a clean place, given correct medicine and vaccinations and eat high quality hay or open graze on pasture, McKnight said. After the cows are milked, the milk is sent to an on-site cheese room via a tube, where the cheese process begins. 

The simplest way to make cultured cheese begins with milk, which is either pasteurized or not, and is then heated to a specific temperature. A bacterial culture is added, which ferments the milk's lactose into lactic acid, beginning the ripening process. 

The length of ripening depends on the type of cheese being made. Next, animal-derived or manufactured rennet is added, causing the milk to coagulate into curds. The curds are then cut, stirred and heated to separate from the liquid whey. The liquid whey is then used by the creamery to fertilize the pastures. 

The size of the curds and how long they are processed affects the final cheese's texture. The curds are gathered into a mold and pressed, or not, depending on the desired cheese. After the cheese has formed, it is salted, typically on the second day, and then it undergoes further aging to develop its final flavor and texture. 

Justin Burdett, the head cheesemaker, said that making cheese is a lot of math and watching the clock, making sure everything is perfectly balanced. 

“It’s a lot of chemistry — you’re playing with pH all the time,” Burdett said. “You are fighting the safe levels where bacteria doesn’t grow, we are trying to grow really good bacteria and keep the bad out.” 

Burdett came from a life of restaurants and said that he feels like he found a second career that he seriously loves. He joked that the cheese room is where chefs go to spend their final days. 

Elin Arnaudin is the herd manager at the creamery and has been in the industry for a while – namely working in New Zealand, the pinnacle of dairy farming, for 12 years. She lives on the farm, as do Hawley and McKnight, because something could happen at any moment, and in the dairy industry, you must constantly be there. 

She said she enjoys that almost everything happens on the farm, that the cheese is sold at mostly farmers' markets, and being able to grow grass and manage it with cows rather than the more unappealing confined dairy system. 

“This is the idyllic dairy farm,” Arnaudin said. “It’s so perfect.” 

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