Celebrating Sustainability

Although Earth Day has come and gone, we at Forever Cheese continue to look for ways to become more sustainable and reduce waste on a daily basis. We are dedicated to becoming more green and are proud of the commitments we’ve made to the environment so far. One way we do this is through our support of Carbonfund.org, the leading carbon offset nonprofit, with which we’ve been partnering since 2007. We realize that shipping cheese has a hefty carbon footprint, and Carbonfund helps us offset this throughout the year through investments in projects worldwide. Over the past 12 years, we have offset the equivalent of greenhouse gas emissions from 30 million miles of driving by the average passenger vehicle, CO2 emissions from over 1,900 homes’ electricity usage for a year, and carbon sequestered by over 12,000 acres of U.S. forest. We invest in renewable energy projects, supporting wind and hydroelectric ventures in the U.S. and also reforestation in Panama. Our partnership with Carbonfund is very important to us as a company. We think it’s imperative to do our part to combat global climate change and ensure a cleaner future.

A big part of this is mindfully choosing who we work with and supporting those producers that are doing their part to become more sustainable and reduce their impact on the environment. We want to highlight several of these cheesemakers and encourage you to seek out their products if you too are interested in supporting environmentally friendly businesses!

Le Fattorie Fiandino
Fiandino, makers of Gran Kinara, Lou Bergier, and L’Ottavio, are known for their raw cow’s milk cheese made with thistle rennet, as well as their 1889 butter and butter cookies. They have always been sensitive to environmental issues and promote sustainability in the daily operations of their farm. They raise Bruna Alpina cows and grow all the feed in their fields. When they need additional milk, they collect it from local farms located just 15 km away or less. This reduces the environmental impact by cutting down on transportation and emissions. In addition to installing solar panels to generate a percentage of their electricity, they reduce waste whenever possible, with the goal of becoming a zero-waste facility.

Additionally, their use of thistle rennet in all of their cheeses eliminates the need to harvest traditional rennet from calves’ stomachs. They use the Cynara cardunculus plant, a common wild thistle. Their innovation is great for vegetarians, and Gran Kinara is the first and only long-aged cheese produced with real vegetable rennet. We love their commitment to these practices and their compassion shows through their cheeses, which are unique and tied to their region, Piemonte.

Product Highlight: Gran Kinara

A Grana Padano style cheese made with vegetarian rennet, Fiandino uses thistle flowers to coagulate Gran Kinara. It is aged one year, and develops floral aromas and an umami-rich paste that has a hint of tang from the thistle. It’s a wonderful vegetarian-friendly aged cheese that can be used just as you would traditional Parmigiano Reggiano.

Quattro Portoni
Quattro Portoni, led by brothers Bruno and Alfio Gritti, make farmstead cheeses from 100% water buffalo milk. The farmland was bought by their father Renato, and it originally operated as a cattle farm, and eventually become a cow dairy. The brothers made the switch from cows to buffalo in the early 2000s, with Alfio focusing on the animals’ welfare after earning a veterinary degree. With help from a local consultant, Bruno established the cheesemaking side of the dairy, which had previously worked with just fluid milk. Their farm, in the town of Cologno al Serio near Bergamo, has a short production chain, with the animals raised on site as well as all of the corn, wheat, hay, and forage that they eat. By keeping everything on the farm, the milk is fresher, the culture kept local, and they are able to have total control over the flavor of their cheese. They also convert all their organic waste to biogas to use instead of coal or natural gas. As they continue to evolve and grow, their priority is sustainability and the welfare of their unique, elegant animals.

Product Highlight: Liteggio di Bufala

Our newest cheese from Quattro Portoni, Liteggio is special in part because it is made with raw buffalo milk, which is quite rare. Aged 90 days until semi-firm, the crumbly pearly white paste accentuates all the best things about buffalo milk: a sweet, delicate aroma and flavor, with a slightly earthy, tangy finish. It’s unmistakably rich and a true gem.

Quesos Larra
Miguel Aznárez Lus makes Roncal DOP in the hills of Navarra. The name of his company, Larra, means grassy meadow in Basque, and those mountain meadows dot the landscape in the area. Miguel grew up in the Roncal Valley and wanted to do something that gave back to his region and helped preserve its traditions. He and his brother Eliodoro decided to make the traditional cheese Roncal and are now one of only a handful of producers. They built their sheep farm and dairy in 1985 and have been making the raw sheep’s milk cheese ever since. As they grew, they started buying milk from other local farmers to supplement, and now help support 16 family farms. Uniquely, according to Miguel, they are the only cheese plant in the world that uses solar power to heat the milk during coagulation. We are proud that they are finding new ways to be more sustainable while continuing the tradition of such a classic and distinct Spanish cheese.

Product Highlight: Roncal DOP

Roncal is made exclusively from the raw milk of Latxa sheep, native to the region. Miguel ages it for a minimum of 5 months, during which it develops a smooth beige natural rind. The texture is firm with lots of butterfat and the flavor is piquant and spicy with a long, persistent finish. It’s like Manchego’s sharper, more complex, and mysterious cousin.

Quesos Parra Jiménez The Parra Jiménez family, maker of our Mitica® Organic Manchego, is well versed in organic agriculture and has been committed to it for over 25 years. Brothers Javier, Francisco, and Luis started out farming organic grapes for their wines, then expanded to other crops like garlic, grains, and peas. They finally started making cheese in 2010, focusing on organic sheep’s milk, as sheep are very well adapted to the plains of Castilla La Mancha. Ana, who comes from a cheesemaking family and married into the Parra clan, is the head cheesemaker.

In 2008, they converted their entire property to biodynamic agriculture, a holistic way of farming that is even more restrictive than organic. It requires deep knowledge of the soil, plants, and animals and treats them as one singular organism. Their farm was perfect for it, because of their wide variety of crops and the introduction of sheep – the crops feed the animals, who fertilize the crops. It allows their farm to be self-sustainable and closed circle, so that everything they need they grow themselves. They now raise over 3,500 sheep as their venture continues to grow.  And with no chemical fertilizers or pesticides, there is no contamination of the environment. Their hard work over the years has allowed them to become the only Manchego producer with biodynamic certification.

Product Highlight: Mitica® Organic Manchego

The Parra family’s skills truly shine in this six month aged Manchego. The wheels are covered in a grey natural rind, and the straw colored paste has aromas of buttered popcorn and lanolin. It perfectly balances salt and sweetness with herbal, nutty notes. It’s creamy in the mouth with just a bit of a crumble. We didn’t introduce an organic Manchego until we found the perfect one, and this is it.

Biodynamic farming includes nine preparations scheduled in tandem with planetary cycles to aid in the fertilization of fields. These preparations range from adding crushed quartz to a cow’s horn and burying it in the spring to creating herbal teas from stinging nettle and horsetail plants to promote growth of beneficial organisms in compost.