On a late-winter Saturday at the Carrboro farmers' market, people gathered around the Chapel Hill Creamery table despite the chill.
Next to a sign that read "Farmhouse cheese – Jersey Dairy with intensive rotational grazing" were rows of cheese: fresh and smoked mozzarella, paneer, Asiago, "Pheta," a Camembert-style cheese called Carolina Moon, a younger version called New Moon, a young tangy cheese called Dairlyand Farmers' Cheese, and Hickory Grove, the creamery's Muenster-like signature cheese.
Answering questions about an unlabeled cheese on the table, cheese maker Florence Hawley says, "That's our experiment."
Neither Hawley nor her partner, Portia McKnight, grew up on farms, but experimenting is how they've found their way as dairy farmers and cheese makers.
The two started Chapel Hill Creamery a little more than a decade ago. Now their cheeses are available at grocery stores and restaurants across the state. In Charlotte, you may have tasted their mozzarella on pizza at Pie Town or found their cheeses in the dairy section at Earth Fare.
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