Continuing on the Bavarian and Austrian cheesemaker visits, we stopped by two very different cheesemaking dairies, Kaeskuche Isny and Sennerei Zurwies.

Kaeskuche Isny - Isny im Allgäu
Located in south-eastern Baden-Württemberg, Kaeskuche Isny was founded in 1998 by a group of ecologically-minded dairy farmers with a view to providing a consistent market for their milk as well as the opportunity to showcase its high quality by converting it into cheese.

The farmers formed a co-operative and hired cheesemaker Evelyn Wild to manage and run the dairy. The dairy has proved to be such a success under Evelyn’s management that she has now hired an additional full time cheesemaker, Simon, to focus on production, allowing her to focus on other aspects of the business. Simon was brought up and trained as a cheesemaker in Switzerland.

In many mountainous regions of the world, the summer months bring a tradition of transhumance. This is a centuries-old practice, where people and animals make an annual pilgrimage to the upper slopes of the mountains to take advantage of the bounty of the summer pastures.

Traveling up in late spring and returning in early autumn, they spend several months living and working on their mountain farms, grazing their animals on the myraid of rich summer herbs, grasses and flowers and turning the resulting quality milk into highly prized cheeses. These mountain dairies are frequently situated in breathtakingly beautiful locations, making you feel as if you're on top of the world.