"ArtisanCheese" news and stories

• It's not yet Halloween, but the L.A. Times holiday cookie contest is up and running. Give it your best shot.
• Even farmers markets aren't immune to cheating and fraud. California is tackling concerns head-on.
• Psst...interested in some good hash? (No, not that kind.)
• What's a dairy farmer to do in this economy? Switch gears away from commodity milk and toward artisan cheese.

Over the past five years, the local food movement has helped spur the production of local artisanal cheeses in non-traditional dairy states, such as Nebraska, Illinois and Georgia. Although Vermont, California and Wisconsin remain cheesemaking hubs, other states are beginning to lead the way with farmstead cheeses like Little Bloom on the Prairie from Illinois, Georgia's Green Hill and Nebraska's Lancaster Duet.

Leslie Cooperband from Prairie Fruits Farm in Illinois and Charuth Loth from Farmstead First in Nebraska are both diversifying their farms and selling cheeses directly to customers at local markets.

"The perception of consumers is changing," Loth says. "People are starved for a connection with the farm." Loth and her fellow co-owner Krista Dittman laughed, saying that they feel they're engaging in "rural counseling" -- helping to reestablish a lost connection between food and the earth.

Gouda fans and those who love sweet, butterscotch-like flavors in their savory snacks may well go wild for Lancaster Duet, a cow and goat's milk cheese from Farmstead First in Lancaster, Neb.

A bite of this beautiful caramel-colored cheese initiates a complicated succession of flavors that begins with notes of dried dates and apricots, evolves into honey and candy and finally tapers off with a mild, sweet and milky tang. Its texture mimics its broad range of flavors: dense, with a sturdy exterior, it yields at a bite to reveal an incredibly creamy center.

In layman's terms, this is a handcrafted gastronomic masterpiece cave-aged to perfection. The complex cheese comes courtesy of Farmstead First, a collaboration between Krista Dittman (right) of Branched Oak Farm, 15 miles north of Lincoln, and Charuth Loth (left) of nearby Shadow Brook Farm. The name "duet" refers to the collaboration itself and the use of two different milks in the cheese. (Incidentally, this means Lancaster Duet is not officially a "farmstead" fromage, which must use milk from only one farm).

Learn more and find out where to find the cheese after the jump.