Tall, sun-tanned, unshaven and with wind-swept, graying hair, Jostein Sande looks the part. He would seem out of place in New York and Shanghai, but here in the West Norwegian Fjords, this goat farmer and cheese manufacturer is a man in his environment.
I met Jostein at the Herdalssetra Mountain Summer Farm near Norddal where he and his 4 Austrian trainees tend to 300 to 400 goats and produce delicious cheese from goat milk. The goats spend the summer up here in the midst of this spectacular landscape, running free and munching happily on the fresh grass that is trying to make the best of a short growing season. With wild flowers as far as the eye can see and snow-covered mountains and waterfalls all around, the goats, sheep, cows and horses up here at the summer farm contribute significantly to the maintenance of an ancient cultivated landscape and the remarkable biological diversity. An analysis of this mountain pasture at 500 m elevation has found 54 different types of plants in an area 10 m x 10 m (33 ft x 33 ft) in size. This is the most diverse plant life in the country.
Sadly, diminishing summer farming in Norway spells the destruction of this ancient farming practice and the irreplaceable pasture landscapes. Without grazing, the pasture landscape is quickly taken over by brush and overgrown with birch. Meanwhile, Jostein and his partner and farm co-owner Åshild Dale are doing their best to keep summer farming alive. Around the year 1850 about 100,000 summer farms were active in Norway. Today there are approximately 1,800 summer farms left with a total of 15 – 20,000 goats and 35 – 40,000 cows.
All farms follow the same, many centuries-old tradition of keeping the animals at the base farms at low elevations during the winter. Every June the goats, sheep and cows are herded to the summer farms in the mountains where they stay until September. The Herdalssetra Mountain Summer Farm has continuously been used in this way for over 300 years.
The practice of summer farming is as old as the 12th century when Norwegian law prevented farmers from keeping their animals at the winter farms during the summer. Also, in olden times the goats and cows gave 2/3 of their annual milk production during the summer farming period. To preserve the value of the “harvest” well into the long winter months, farmers developed the practice of processing the milk to make cheese.
The production of whey and brown cheese and goat’s milk caramels is the key element of summer farming at the Herdalssetra Mountain Summer Farm. In, what arguably might qualify as the smallest cheese factory in the world, Jostein and his helpers produce the delicious cheeses right on site. It sells throughout Norway.
At one point during my visit to the Herdalssetra, Jostein explained to me the manufacturing process of the cheese. By the third step, in what seemed to me like a long and intricate process, he had lost me. Eventually, I had to ask: “Who taught you the cheese making recipe?” “Well, the cheese making craft has long been in the family” Jostein replied, “since 1790 to be exact.”
As I try some pieces of goat cheese and finish off the taste test with a chunk of caramel, I understand the old adage that you can’t rush perfection. Compliments to the many generations of summer farmers at Herdalssetra!