It’s not every day you visit a farm stand filled with butter and cheese instead of fruits and vegetables.
Kriemhild Kupboard is a self-serve stand on state Route 12B, three miles from the village of Hamilton. It’s owned and operated by Kriemhild Dairy Farms, which uses milk from its own grass-fed herd and other grass-fed milk suppliers in Central New York to produce its full-fat and cultured dairy products. The name is pronounced CREAM-hild, fittingly enough.
Kriemhild’s flagship product is meadow butter, which is made by slowly churning fresh sweet cream the old-fashioned way – in barrel churns. The end result is a rich, creamy, flavorful butter with a butterfat content of 85%, similar to high-end European butters like Kerrygold and President. (For comparison, supermarket butters are about 80% butterfat. Here’s a good guide to the world of butters.)
Several varieties of Kriemhild butter are available: meadow butter, cultured meadow butter and baker’s butter. All are available unsalted or salted, and the salt used comes from Seneca Lake. Kriemhild also produces creme fraiche, which is similar to sour cream but not as tangy, to my tastebuds, anyway.
If you’ve never tasted small-batch, grass-fed butter, you’re in for a treat. To know my other half is to know he loves butter, and he loves the Kriemhild salted meadow butter on toast, potatoes and other vegetables.
Looking ahead to the holidays and holiday baking, I splurged on a couple rolls of Kriemhild unsalted baker’s butter to use in cut-outs, sables and shortbread-style cookies. The more butter at the holidays, the merrier, right? I cut the one-pound rolls in halves or quarters and freeze them double-wrapped. It’s a premium product (about $10 per pound), but in baked goods where buttery flavor really stands out, I’m willing to make the investment. I might break some of that holiday butter out early and make a pound cake.
Kriemhild Kupboard also carries goods from other local producers, including bread from HeartStone Artisan Bakery, milk, cheeses and yogurt from Stoltzfus Family Dairy, sauerkraut and other fermented foods from Food and Ferments, dried mushrooms from Fruit of the Fungi, and gelato from Jones Family Farm, to name a few.
The Kupboard is open daily from dawn to dusk. It’s at 1093 state Route 12B, Hamilton, a couple miles south of Good Nature Farm Brewery. We made our trip double the fun by stopping at the brewery for a beer and a bite. The stand operates on the honor system. There’s pencil and paper to add up your purchases and a cash box to make change. There’s also a credit card reader, in case you go on a butter-buying binge.
Product photo courtesy of Kriemhild Dairy Farms, on Facebook.
All other photos © Margaret McCormick.
