JORDAN, ONONDAGA CO. (AP) -- If you're in the market for cheese that looks and tastes the same, day after day, no matter where or when you buy it, you're better off in a supermarket than on the new Finger Lakes Cheese Trail.
If you're in the mood for varieties, flavors and textures that you've never encountered before - and probably couldn't find anywhere else - then the 10 "cheeseries" on this trail offer what you crave.
There's Irish-style "washed rind" cheese, fresh American takes on the cheese of the Alpine region and cheese made with high-probiotic kefir. There's cheese from cow's milk, goat's milk and sheep's milk. There are raw milk and pasteurized cheeses, and cheeses that are hard, soft and semisoft.
"I don't think any two of us are doing the same thing, really," said Meg Schader, who owns Wake Robin Farm in Jordan with her husband, Bruce.
"This is what it means to be artisanal," she said, using a term associated with small-scale operations that craft their products by hand, rather than by mass production.
Wake Robin, a 4-year-old business best known for its yogurt and milk, is 15 miles west of Syracuse. It's the only cheese trail member in Onondaga County. The other nine stretch south nearly to the Pennsylvania border and as far west as near Watkins Glen.
Unlike the region's 100-plus wineries, which in the heart of the Finger Lakes can be just a few hundred yards from one another, the cheeseries are more spread out - one estimate is that it would take seven hours to reach all of them, without time for stopping.
They're also not as well-staffed, so they aren't as likely to be open to visitors on a regular basis.
That's why they banded together with the trail concept this year, sponsoring identity-boosting events like an upcoming open house featuring all the members on July 10. They've also found a spot in the newest version of the Finger Lakes tourist map handed out at local wineries.
The trail members, who represent almost all the cheesemakers in the region, say they are a natural fit for the area. The best wineries have made names for themselves producing relatively small amounts of handcrafted or artisanal wines, and that has spurred the development of the Finger Lakes as a culinary destination.
"Wine and cheese are a natural pairing," said Keeley McGarr, owner and cheesemaker at Keeley's Cheese Co., located on her family's McGarr Farms dairy operation in King Ferry, southern Cayuga County. "When you have wine and cheese from the same terrain, the same soils, the same climate, then it should be even better."
At Wake Robin, the cheeses are based on classic European varieties but take on a local flavor because of the diet of the cows, the time of year, the subtle changes they make in adding cultures and "cooking" the cheeses, aging and more.
"Making cheese involves a living culture," Bruce Schader said. "You can control that to a point, then it does what it does."
You'll see seasonal differences, too, he said. In summer, the cow's milk has less butterfat and more protein than in winter.
For that reason, the same cheese that's sort of an off-white color in winter will take on an orange-yellow tint in summer.
In King Ferry, McGarr is hoping to make use of the ambient microorganisms in her basement cheese storage area to help give her products a distinctive flavor. Her cheeses are a type known as "washed rind," which means they are bathed in a brine solution that adds pungent aromas but frequently leads to smooth and creamy cheeses.
She's also researching a project to wash some of her cheeses in wine produced by the nearby King Ferry Winery, which makes Treleaven Wines. "That will give the cultures something to feed on," she said.
A few miles way, at Finger Lakes Dexter Creamery, also in King Ferry, cheesemaker Rose Marie Belforti is producing what may be the region's most unusual product: Her cheese comes from Irish Dexter cows, which are quite a bit smaller than Jerseys or Holsteins, and she uses a culture based on kefir grains, a collection of microorganisms that are more traditionally used to make a yogurtlike drink high in probiotics.
"A lot of foodies, or locavores -- people who want local food -- like the variations we offer," Belforti said.
Belforti said she was astonished at how quickly the trail concept came together this year.
Much of the work was done by Monika Roth, an agriculture development specialist who works out of the Tompkins County Cornell Cooperative Extension office.
Roth said the idea began a few years ago with efforts to boost the profile of local cheesemakers by staging some special events. The more coordinated cheese trail program took off this spring.
(Copyright ©2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
