www.sweetgrassdairy.com

A culinary trip down to Georgia often includes shrimp and grits, barbecue, crispy flounder and red velvet cake. Now Green Hill, a creamy bloomy rind cow's milk cheese, can be added to that gastronomic list thanks to Sweet Grass Dairy in Thomasville, Ga.

Tasting a piece of Green Hill is like opening a taste bud treasure chest. Its lush creamy texture melts dreamily on the palate, leaving a pleasantly mild tang.

While Green Hill shares many characteristics with its imported French cousin, Camembert, it boasts a uniquely buttery consistency. And whereas most imported Camembert has become industrialized for the United States market, Green Hill remains a standout handmade farmstead cheese.

The fromage's gooey texture and sweet taste has a lot to do with the breed of Jersey cows that are raised at Sweet Grass Dairy.

"We wanted to make a cheese that really showed off the rich, buttery characteristics of the milk from our pasture-grazed cows," says Jessica Little, co-owner (along with husband Jeremy) of Sweet Grass Dairy -- something "sweet, salty, unctuous and gooey."

The two worked on Green Hill for two years, and their efforts paid off. Its rich flavor is also a result of the grasses that the cows are munching from the southern Georgia soil. The humid subtropical climate has an effect not just on the grasses that become part of the cows' diet, but on the cows themselves (if they can endure it; only certain cow breeds can handle the heat during a typical summer on the farm down south).

"In southern Georgia, summer can be really brutal and many breeds of dairy cattle are from very cool climates," Little says. "Jerseys can tolerate the heat very well and also graze well."

Sweet Grass Dairy is truly a family-run operation: Green Hill is named after Little's parents' flagship dairy, called Green Hill Dairy, located about 25 miles from the cheesemaking plant. In 2000, the Sweet Grass Dairy got its start under Little's parents, Al and Desiree Wehner.

"My mother started with the book 'Cheesemaking at Home' by Ricki Carroll, and she made cheeses in her kitchen for a year," Little says. After traveling to Italy and France and taking a course in cheesemaking at UC Davis, Desiree was inspired by the wide variety of cheeses and decided to make not only cow's milk but also goat's milk cheeses.

In 2002, Little moved down with her husband, Jeremy, to learn the process of cheesemaking.

"My mother hired a French cheesemaker from the Pyrenees region of France who spent about a month teaching Jeremy as much as he could," Little recalls. "The rest has been trial and error, and learning as it goes," she says. "It's not unlike a chef working with ingredients until he finally has a recipe that he really likes and wants to replicate."

Green Hill is available year-round and can be purchased for about $9 per piece directly from their recently opened retail shop, located on the farm at 19345 US Highway 19 North. Alternatively, the cheese is sold on their Web site. To find the store nearest you that carries this cheese, check out this Web site.