Cheese plant aids 'can'-do way of life

0 Comments | La Crosse Tribune, Jun 01, 1998

CASHTON, Wis.--You won't see milk tanker trucks pull up at the Wisconsin Hill & Valley Cheese Co-op, an Amish-owned cheese plant 5 miles southeast of Cashton. The milk still arrives in old-fashioned 10-gallon cans, from farms where well water is used to keep the cans cool.

But production continues to increase at the plant, which opened in March 1983. It produced a record 4.4 million pounds of cheese last year, and production probably will increase 2 percent this year, said Kevin Everhart, plant manager and vice president of Hill & Valley Cheese Inc. "We continually add farms," he explained.

The number of co-op members continues to grow slowly. About 230 Amish farmers and one non-Amish farmer sell their milk to the co-op. That's up from 223 producers in 1995.

Everhart, of rural Westby, and his brother, Mike, of West Jefferson, N.C., own Hill & Valley Cheese Inc., which owns the cheese-making equipment and employs the workers.

The Amish avoid violating their religious beliefs by contracting with the Everharts to make the cheese (with modern technology) and sell it for them. The Amish producers also contract with six milk haulers to truck their milk to the plant, which turns about 2,000 cans of milk a day into cheese.

Local Amish farmers formed the cooperative and built the cheese plant to solve the problem of a declining number of outlets for milk in cans. "We're not really competing against bulk milk," Everhart said. "That's why they built this in the first place."

Today, Everhart said, "We're getting milk from the Cashton, Wilton, Tomah, Hillsboro, Readstown, Viroqua and Chaseburg areas." The co-op's largest increase in milk production has been in the Chaseburg and Viroqua areas, where the Amish population has been growing.

The milk is picked up at the farm more frequently than bulk milk would be, and is made into cheese the same day it comes to the plant.

"Probably 90 percent of the milk is made into cheese within 24 hours of when it comes out of the cow," Everhart said. Cheese made from can milk has the same quality as that made from bulk milk, he said.

Cheese with the Hill & Valley label is sold at the plant store, at the Amish Cheese House in Sparta and at Burnstad's in Tomah. And people scattered around the nation, especially Amish and tourists who've been through the Cashton area, buy it by mail order.

"Most of it goes national,' Everhart said of the plant's cheese, and much of it goes to Texas and Florida. Hill & Valley Cheese sells 40-pound blocks to cheese distributors who repackage or shred it and apply their own labels.

For the past two years, Everhart and his brother, Mike, also have contracted to run a cheese plant in Middlefield, Ohio, for Amish farmers. And Mike, who formerly lived in Westby, is part owner of a cheese plant in West Jefferson, N.C.

HILL & VALLEY CHEESE

* WHAT: The Wisconsin Hill & Valley Cheese Co-op cheese factory near Cashton, Wis., is owned by Amish farmers. Hill & Valley Cheese Inc., owned by Kevin and Mike Everhart, operates the plant.

* EMPLOYEES: The cheese factory has 22 employees this time of year. There are fewer in October and November, which is the plant's slowest time.

* VARIETIES: Hill & Valley Cheese comes in several varieties, including Monterey jack, pepper jack, colby jack, colby, Muenster and cheddar.