Dublin & Dairy: How Dublin Christian Academy is Honoring Its Roots

If you’re from New England and read the news often, you have probably caught wind of how dairy farms in the region are struggling. And they’ve recently hit an even deeper blow when Danone announced they would stop purchasing dairy from over 90 Northeast dairy farms. In our role as a food distributor, we have a responsibility to our farmers to help them find solutions to problems like these. 

When Pete Miller of Miller Farm (you might remember reading about them last year) came to Food Connects looking for ways to get his Vermont dairy into schools as another market for his high-quality product, we were a bit stumped at first. Schools often have milk available for students in single-serving small bottles. For many public schools, purchasing local milk every week just wasn’t financially feasible—making it a tough sell for Pete to invest in the special bottling equipment needed. 

Enter Dublin Christian Academy (DCA). DCA is a local pre-K through 12th-grade private school in Dublin, New Hampshire. And a staple of most private schools is their school nutrition programs are often independently run, are not limited by the same USDA purchasing standards, and have larger budgets. When we approached DCA about purchasing Miller Farm milk, it was a no-brainer—the school itself used to be a dairy farm. And now, they have a standing order which makes creating the 8 oz single-serving bottles more sustainable for Pete. Knowing that he will have a consistent buyer for the products makes it easier to sell to other schools with less frequent purchasing schedules.

And since August 2021, DCA has purchased more than 2,600 8 oz bottles of Miller Farm milk!

We chatted with Bethany Paquin, Director of Development, to learn more about the school. We wanted to get to know DCA a little bit better and why they’re on board to help local dairy farmers like Pete. 

What made you decide to work with Food Connects?

In 2020-2021 we weren’t able to offer a foods service program to our students because of COVID-19—we provided food to dorm students, but not our normal mass lunches. This gave us the opportunity to look at how our meal service worked. We wanted to offer different food choices and responsibly grown and raised products.

Our values align with “community,” and we love to source our food from farms and local producers. The campus was originally Staghead Farm, before the lands and buildings were donated to become a Christian school in 1964. At first, students were running the farm, which wasn’t sustainable for the school, but our early experiences have left us with very nostalgic feelings about that part of the school’s heritage.

How has the students’ response been to the Miller Farm milk? Are they excited that it is sourced locally?

The students are really enjoying having the local milk available. The younger students are especially enthusiastic about the maple and chocolate milk, which they haven’t had in the past. 

Is there any feedback from the field trip to Miller Farm? What did the students learn? 

Our seventh, eighth, and ninth-grade classes visited. The students are at a point where they are thinking more about where their food comes from and how it is produced. The students said they had a lot of fun and enjoyed learning about the milk bottling process and seeing all the animals, especially the cows that produce the milk. Silas Paquin, an eight grade student, said he drank a whole pint of milk and it was really good. Seventh-grader Sarah Ryan was amused by watching the chickens jump on the cows!

How has this benefitted your students?

There are certainly all the nutritional benefits. But it also develops connections for them in the community. More and more, the students get to recognize the businesses in the community where they get their food from—deepening their sense of place.

Anything else that you would like to share?

This past fall, we had an alumni dinner and featured some Food Connects producers, like Grafton Village Cheese. And this is just another opportunity to build some connections between these farms and the extended DCA family which includes alumni, former faculty, and former parents and grandparents.

Our parents are also really glad to see this partnership—knowing that their kids are getting good quality food from farms and businesses in the community that they trust. It’s a win-win!

Producer Spotlight: Blue Ledge Farm

Food Connects is incredibly lucky to work with some amazing cheese producers in New England. One such dairy is Blue Ledge Farm in Salisbury, VT. Blue Ledge Farm specializes in goat’s milk cheeses that are creamy and a cheese lover’s dream come true. Owner Hannah Sessions took some time out of her busy schedule to share with us a little more about the farm.

Can you share a little about Blue Ledge Farm and how you started?

Greg is from the Philadelphia area of Pennsylvania while Hannah grew up in Cornwall, Vermont, just a few miles from their farm. We met while studying at Bates College, but mostly while abroad in Florence, Italy our junior year. It is there that our dream of an artistic and food-based life and business blossomed! The Italian culture had a wonderful influence on us. After graduation we spent a year in Brattleboro where we were working members of the Coop, Greg was a teacher and Hannah worked at Lilac Ridge Farm in West Brattleboro, where her love of dairy farming really took root. We began looking for our farm and happened upon this piece of land, a retired cow dairy farm, in 2000. When we saw the ribbon of rock ledge (hence the name “Blue Ledge”) we knew this little parcel was perfect for goats. We preserved our farm with the Vermont Land Trust and used these proceeds to build our first cheese plant-the smallest in the state at that time—in 2002, also the year our first child was born! Those were some busy times! We now employ ten people, milk a herd of 150 goats, and purchase milk from a local family cow dairy. Blue Ledge Farm now produces about 60,000 lbs of cheese annually. We have sized up but some things remain the same: our animals all have names, our curds are poured by hand, and we love what we do.

What is your favorite thing about farming?

We love knowing that what we do is important. As farmers, we feed people and support life. In addition, we are learning more and more that various farming practices can have a major impact on mitigating climate change, so it’s nice knowing that we are on the front lines of some exciting developments there. We also love watching things grow. To raise an animal from birth and see her develop into a part of the herd is pretty amazing. We have some “lines” of goats that extend back generations, and we can point to certain traits and remember that doe’s great-great-great grandmother, Marcy, for example.

What makes your products unique?

The gentle handling of curds make for a lighter texture, and the quality and freshness of our milk (we process every one to three days) make for our signature clean flavor. Blue Ledge is also an Animal Welfare Approved farm and I feel contentment in the animals come through in great milk and therefore delicious cheese. Our cow’s milk comes from the grass-fed Ayrshire cows at MoSe Farm, a breed known for their exceptional creamy milk due to smaller particles of components (protein and butterfat). We are lucky to be able to source milk from this relatively rare and beautiful breed of cow.

What is one of your favorite cheeses (we know it's hard to choose)? Or a recipe you like to make with them?

It's hard to choose a favorite cheese when you make 14 types! We love all of our cheeses, and there is a season for each. If we had to cheese a “desert island cheese”- as in one that we would choose were we stuck on a desert island—it has always been the Crottina. It’s a classic, simple and lovely cheese.

Why is selling locally and the local food movement important to you?

It is in our mission statement to always sell half or more of our cheese in Vermont, the state that we love and that was there for us at the onset. Loyalty is bred locally. Also, we enjoy direct feedback from customers. As a food producer, we also feel a connection to creating a sense of place, and that comes from emphasizing local. We have a farmstand on our farm that serves both locals as well as tourists and seasonal folks. As food producers, we feed our communities but also create an experience and sense of place that can make an impression on visitors as to what Vermont embodies. In this way, food producers are able to provide a double boost to our economy: via food and tourism.

How does working with Food Connects help your business?

Food Connects provides an important service as perhaps the greatest challenge for business in a rural state like Vermont is getting your product from “point A to point B”, especially when the product is perishable! We collaborate with a local farm to get our product to Food Connects and they consolidate orders and deliver from their warehouse. Recently we have gone from being a special order item on the Food Connects docket to a regularly stocked item, so that has been exciting! 

Anything else you would like me to feature? Anything that you are doing to respond to the COVID-19 crisis?

The pandemic has highlighted more than ever the value of local food feeding your community. When store shelves are bare whether due to a nationwide pandemic or labor shortage, it’s the local farms and processors that you can rely on that keep you fed! If you support them, they will in turn support you!

Producer Spotlight: Smith's Country Cheese

At Food Connects, we are so fortunate to work with so many cheese producers throughout the region. We’re excited to feature Smith’s Country Cheese based out of Winchendon, MA. Passed from one family to the next, Smith’s Country Cheese is a shining example of how new and young farmers can learn from previous generations and how they can work together to conserve farmland for future generations. Plus, they make some darn good cheese! We interviewed Leah Catlin, one of the four owners, to find out more about the farm and its awesome story!

Can you share a little about the history of the farm? What inspired you and your family to start farming?

Smith’s Country Cheese has been a family-owned-and-operated, working dairy farm and creamery in the heart of North Central Massachusetts for over thirty years. Mr. David Smith and his family built the business and the brand from the barn up, growing the starting Holstein herd from 20 to 220 head, and working to become Massachusetts’ original farmstead producer of award-winning Gouda, Cheddar, and Havarti cheeses—all while becoming an industry leader in renewable energy, generating power through solar technology.

In 2013, as David and his wife began approaching retirement age, they began looking for a new owner who would continue Smith’s Country Cheese as a family-operated farm and creamery. It wasn’t until two years later when in the summer of 2015 Jake and Allie Catlin—a week away from welcoming their first daughter—learned that the Smith family was looking to sell their dairy and creamery. Although happy and successful with their jobs outside of Boston (in law enforcement and fitness respectively), they were looking for a more meaningful way of life for themselves and their new family. They made a series of exciting phone calls that put everything into motion: first, a brave phone call to Dave expressing interest in buying the farm without having any formal farming experience; and second, a phone call to Jake’s brother, Mike, and his wife Leah in Atlanta, Georgia, asking them and their two children to move back to Massachusetts and join them on this farm adventure.  

…and the rest is history! The Smiths taught the Catlins how to make cheese and care for the cows on weekends for over a year before the sale was official. Nearly five years later, the Catlins are putting their own mark on the brand, adding new cheeses to their repertoire, and growing the business with innovative ideas.

What makes your farm unique? Could you tell us more about your sustainability efforts?

We are proud to be true farmstead cheese producers. This means that all the milk we use to make our delicious, award-winning cheeses comes from our own herd of Holstein cows. Our cows are milked twice a day, every day and we make cheese about 3-4 days a week at our farm. On cheese-making days, we are using fresh milk from that morning’s milking—it doesn’t get any fresher than that!

We are also proud to continue Dave’s sustainability commitment to reduce our carbon footprint. Our grid-tied photovoltaic solar system offsets over 70% of our hot water and 30% of our electrical usage costs by using the energy of the sun. We make our own compost from cow manure, famously known as “Otter River Black Gold” to manage our farm waste in a green way. In 2020 our compost was certified for Organic producers.

What is one of your favorite cheeses?

I asked everyone to rank their favorite cheeses and got four different answers! But, one of the cheeses we all agree is delicious is the Chive Cheddar—our creamy, mild cheddar serves as the backdrop for a bright and robust chive flavor. We love to snack on it, or add it to eggs, sandwiches, macaroni and cheese, and burgers! 

Why is selling locally and the local food movement important to you?

We love helping people in our community discover and appreciate locally made goods—it really is like finding treasure in your own backyard. Being part of the local food movement is important to us because it helps start the conversation within families about where their food comes from, the environment, and the economy. Shopping locally makes a big impact. I love the saying that when you support a small business an actual, real-life person does a happy dance because it’s 100% true! If you don’t believe us, follow us on Facebook and Instagram!

How does working with Food Connects help your business?

Working with Food Connects allows us to reach a new customer base and to be part of the important conversations they are having regarding the local food movement, agriculture, sustainability, and nutrition. We are confident that we are becoming a household name with the families and communities Food Connects and their programs serve.

Any events coming up or fun facts about your farm?

We will soon be adding some completely new products to our line: farm fresh milk, butter, and yogurt! Stay tuned, Food Connects!

Growing Markets for Local Dairy

We all know that farming isn’t easy and COVID-19 hasn’t made it any easier—particularly for dairy farmers. 

In January of 2020, the VT Agency of Agriculture announced that the state lost 48 dairy farms in 2019. And those that have survived faced the demand for milk plummeting in the early parts of the shutdown, forcing them to dump milk.

“Cows produce milk every single day,” says Leigh Harding, National Account Manager at Jasper Hill Farm, a world leader in artisan cheesemaking based in Greensboro, VT. “And many dairy farms only have one option: to sell their fluid milk directly to the low-paying open market, where the fluid milk price fluctuates drastically daily and is out of their control. It is almost impossible to be a small, independent dairy farmer, selling high-quality fluid milk, and to make a profitable living for yourself and family.”

One way for farmers to avoid dumping milk is to create “value-added products”—cheese, pudding, yogurt, ice cream, etc. Cheese stores longer than liquid milk so can be a good alternative way for farmers to earn back some income. But the cheese industry isn’t safe either—the shutdown of restaurants and schools effectively dried up their markets.

“An integral part of our mission at Jasper Hill Farm is to offer an alternative option,” says Leigh. “We purchase milk from within our local radius at a substantially higher price all year round, taking this milk and turning into superior, award-winning cheese. Every piece of cheese purchased and consumed contributes to that option for family farmers—it is powerful! This commitment to quality incentivizes farmers to participate in sustainable practices that promote herd health and land preservation. The more sustainable livelihood for the farmers means that families can continue to make a living wage, they then spend money locally to boost economic viability, children stay in the area to continue the legacy and raise families who go to school locally and so on and so on.  It is a beautiful (and delicious) circle!”

Part of the Food Connects mission is to support and fortify Thriving Farms. While we have not yet begun to sell fluid milk, there is one thing we do sell a lot of—cheese. In mid-2020 we released our Food Connects Cheese Catalog as a way to help promote and grow the dairy industry in the state. The catalog features 7 Vermont cheese producers, small and large, and over 50 different types of cheeses.

“Food Connects has been able to bring locally-made cheeses to a variety of customers who weren’t being served by traditional distributors, including small farm stands and our regional food hub partners,” said Food Hub Sales Associate Beth Lewand. “Our customers’ appetite is certainly strong for delicious, hand-crafted cheeses, and we’ve delivered nearly $34k worth of cheese since launching the catalog in August and $72.1k overall in 2020, $30k of which was from Grafton Village Cheese, here in Brattleboro, VT.”

Introducing Our Cheese Catalog

Our Food Hub team works hard to bring you a wide variety of delicious, local food. And what is one this New England is known for? Dairy! So check out our brand new cheese catalog highlighting delicious products made by seven different producers in Vermont and Massachusetts!