Neil recently turned 60 and to celebrate I made a cheese cake for him.
I have to say that not all of it is Jannei Cheese but most of it is… If you even fancy a cheese cake for your event please give us a call and we might be able to fix you up.
Author: Janette
Co-Owner of Jannei Goat Dairy
Spring Babies (Kids)
Come visit this years kids try some cheese whilst your hear.
Spring? In the air?
Well here are the first photos as promised! The girls are kidding and they think its spring, even if the humans are seriously still shuddering when the sun goes under a cloud! But we guess they know best.
These photos of a doe and her kids, was the third doe to kid , the two kids on their own came the day before and at the stage of the photos we had six kids in total but since the sleuth photographer was freezing her butt capturing this doe just after kidding, there have been over a dozen mothers dropping two a piece!.
The doe in the picture was busy licking away for 30minutes and didn’t allow one kid to suckle until both where ready, it was very interesting to watch. By the end of this afternoon Neil and I brought in six babies to the top pens. Two more does had kidded that meant Ten! Kids are brought in to keep them out of the way of foxes and the cold night air. If you don’t bring them in the does could loose one to a fox as they don’t seem to be able to protect both kids at once!
The farm hand , Tim, is busy every morning now bringing in kids and taking does up to the bales ready to learn the routine. Kids and mums have to camp near the milking bales so that they can be monitored. Udders need checking and milking out and after 10 days or so the does are let out with the main herd During the day kids are kept safe in pens until the does come back in the afternoon when they are penned and fed.
There are probably 30kids now!
Jannei Goat Dairy will soon be open for Spring Sales. Milk supplies will improve next week and whole sale orders will begin filling again. In September the Dairy opens for three days a week instead of the one day Monday through winter.
Jannei will be open for 8 months for Friday’s, Saturday’s and Monday’s at this stage we are starting slow and as we go hope to get staff and structure in place for farm direct sales! We try to have the kids available for children to see and feed grass to and get a photo with during September to February.
Anyways…..
Watch this space for more photos and updates of the kids they look so cute!
Baby goats – Signs of spring on the way
SYDNEY CHEESE AWARDS October 9, 2010 Gold Medal Winners
In recent news all three of our White mold cheese have now won a Gold at a cheese show! Jannei’s Miette took out he gold in Category 3 – Fresh Curd Matured at the Sydney Cheese Awards.
here’s a link to the website
Also our Bent Back Chèvre, Prairie Cream and Buche Noir all received gold at Melbourne Cheese Show.
Goat’s Cheese and Pumpkin Tart with Cheese Bomb
Check out this goat cheese recipe on the Master Chef website! click here
Melbourne Specialist Cheese Show
Jannei Goat Dairy enters it products annual into the Melbourne Specialist Cheese Show. Click here for documentation about the up coming event.
You can also check out there website at the Australian cheese website.
A visit to Jannei Goat dairy
WE’RE LATE. It’s a grey rainy day in November as we head west along the Great Western Highway past Lithgow heading for Jannei Goat Dairy at Lidsdale. However all is well when we do eventually arrive at Jannei, as Neil and Janette Watson are too busy packing up their cheeses for the following day’s Pyrmont Growers Market in Sydney to be concerned about our late arrival.
The Watsons started their cheese making here in 1995 when Neil decided he wanted a change from teaching agricultural science at a school in Portland. When looking for an alternative income, it’s not surprising that Neil would be thinking milk. He grew up on a dairy farm in that wonderful, rain-blessed dairying country around Wauchope on the NSW central coast.
Initially they intended to sell their fresh goat milk into the Sydney market but found this was not profitable in the volumes they could produce. So Janette supported Neil’s experiments with cheese making.
He started with hard cheeses in 1996, but soon found that what his customers in Sydney really wanted was fresh curd. Just about the only goat curd available in Sydney at the time was coming from Gabriel Kervella in Western Australia. So local chefs and retailers were delighted to have a truly local product. From this base product, Neil has added many award winning cheeses such as their Bent Back Chev, Buche noir and Chevrotin.
Cheese making takes place six days a week and while Neil is busy with the curd, Janette uses her background in advertising and design to market their cheeses to an ever-increasing number of customers.
Jannei milks around eighty goats (mostly Saanen) from a herd of one hundred producing about 130kg of cheese a week. Ninety percent of this is delivered weekly into the Sydney market where Simon Johnson is the main distributor.
Diet for the goats is very important to Neil who goes to great lengths to ensure that every goat in the herd is in peak condition, thus ensuring the highest quality milk for cheese making.
In June 2007 Neil had major heart surgery. During his hospitalisation and subsequent recovery Janette took responsibility for all aspects of the business, including the cheese making. So now they often work together in the cheese making room. The weekly trips Janette makes to the Growers Markets she says are hard work. With the long travel time, some days are barely profitable. Jannette says she looks past the sales and considers it important to be there, as it is their only regular marketing exercise.
If you would like to visit the dairy for a tasting or purchases of their cheese, phone first to check that either Neil or Janette are available. Blessed are the cheese makers.
article by – RF. Russell Smith, www.regionalfood.com.au
Making goat cheese
Quote from website:
“SkillsOne catches up with a couple who have turned their passion for life on the land into an award-winning gourmet goat cheese business.
Neil and Janette Watson decided to follow their dream of owning a farm in the country and opened a goat farm in 1995.
Neil then used the knowledge he learned through a rural science degree to teach himself how to make cheese and dairy products from the goats’ milk. They now have a lucrative gourmet business.”
An interview on ABC
Farming dairy goats and making award-winning cheeses isn’t something Neil Watson planned.
It’s a career, business and lifestyle he and wife Janette just sort of fell into.
“We started in 1995 and it sort of happened by mistake really,” he laughs.
“We had 40 acres and we thought ‘surely there’s some sort of farming we can do on a small acreage and make a living’.
“So we decided to try dairy goats.”
The couple bought a small mob of dairy goats and started farming them as a hobby west of Lithgow in NSW.
“The cheese making happened when we realised that selling fresh milk was quite competitive.”
“We then decided to experiment with cheese making and we found out we could do it,” Mr Watson laughs.
“Although I was trained in agriculture, I wasn’t specifically trained in cheese making.
“So over the years it’s just gradually developed and grown and it’s turned into quite a successful small business.”
The couple has won dozens of awards for their cheeses.
“It’s pretty hard to win awards, it’s quite competitive,” Mr Watson says.
“But we always manage to win here and there.
“We won our first award in 1998 at the Australian Specialist Cheesemakers’ Association Cheese Show in Melbourne.
“We make a number of different varieties of cheeses.
“Some are hard, but our most popular ones are the fresh cheeses, which are soft.
“Then we do some white mold cheeses as well.
“We also sell fresh milk and yoghurt.”
The couple’s cheeses are in high demand.
“Most of our cheese goes to Sydney to supply restaurants,” he says.
There are about 120 milking does at the Jannei Goat Dairy at Lidsdale.
“We milk up to 80 every year,” Neil Watson says.
“We sell a lot of the young females on the export market.
“But we keep quite a few too for replacements and to grow the herd a bit more.”
It’s currently kidding time at the farm.
The piercing bleat of baby goats can be heard ringing out across the paddocks.
“We’ve got kids everywhere,” he says.
“It’s normal for goats to have twins and triplets are fairly common as well.
“We shut the baby goats up in pens so they don’t wander off and get lost.
“Then when we let them out there’s big rush as they all try to find their mothers.”
After the goats have given birth and fed their offspring, the amount of milk they produce starts to rise.
“Our goats average about two litres of milk a day,” Neil Watson says.
“But it can get up to four or five litres.
“[That enables us] to get that cash-flow going and we can afford to buy in the grain and hay to feed the goats.
“We feed them lucerne hay, oats and grain.
“We’ve started buying the big bales of hay because it’s a lot more economic.
“Our feed bill is our main expense.”
Mr Watson says there are only about four or five goat dairies in NSW.
“We’re probably the only registered goat dairy in the state’s Central West.”
Interview by Brad Markham from Lidsdale 2790, Wednesday, 02/09/2009
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