Barbara Harfmann

With adjectives like stretchy, cheesy and crumbly, cheese has several textures, while flavors range from salty or sharp to nutty or creamy. From mozzarella used as a pizza topping to ricotta cheese in a lasagna to melty cheddar on top of a chargrilled burger, the superlatives around cheese don’t quit.

When Dairy Foods headed off to Green Bay, Wis., on a snowy Tuesday in early March, I couldn’t envision how much fun I’d have attending my first cheese contest which was held March 4-6 at the Resch Expo.  

The flavor gates are open wide and beckoning. While classic flavors like vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, and coffee will forever anchor the category, flavors that spark curiosity, spicy-sweet flavors, and floral, botanical, and fruit profiles with a twist along with new “it” flavors like pistachio, matcha, and lemon-blueberry are surging in popularity.

When it comes to ingredients, protein is one of the most important ingredients naturally found in dairy foods like milk, cheese, cottage cheese and yogurt. 

Becky Rasdall Vargas, senior vice president of trade and workforce policy at the International Dairy Foods Association (IDFA), joins us for Episode 52 of the “Let’s Talk Dairy” podcast to discuss “Tariffs and Supply Chain Challenges.” Based in Washington, D.C., the IDFA, since 1990, represents the dairy manufacturing industry including cheese, milk and ice cream processors. 

The cooperative’s claim to fame is its award-winning cottage cheese, which won the prestigious Best of Class Gold Medal in the 2020 World Championship Cheese Contest for its 4% Small Curd Cottage Cheese.

Nestled in the rolling hills of west central Wisconsin 35 miles southeast of La Crosse, Wis., Westby Cooperative Creamery was founded on October 31, 1903, with humble beginnings as a butter and dried milk producer. 

Manufacturing 42 varieties of premium cheese in the heart of America’s Dairyland not only takes a ton of high-quality raw milk — 1.8 million pounds a day, or 534 million pounds annually, to be exact, in the case of Marshfield, Wis.-based Nasonville Dairy. 

Recognizing that March is “Women's History Month,” Dairy Foods, for the third consecutive year, proudly recognizes the outstanding achievements women have made within the multifaceted dairy industry. 

In addition to making seven varieties of spicy, hot cheddar cheeses such as Carolina Reaper and Scorpion, central Wisconsin-based Nasonville Dairy, a third-generation, medium-sized cheese processor, is “hot” for handcrafting 42 varieties of premium cheese, including Cheddar, Colby, along with many flavored cheeses like Blue Marble Jack, Garlic & Herb, and Horseradish.