Northshore magazine showcases the best that the North Shore of Boston, MA has to offer.
Issue link: https://read.uberflip.com/i/491440
180 It wasn't until Cantelmo was 23 years old and working at Savenors, a gourmet butcher shop and cheese purveyor on Charles Street in Boston, that she was bitten by the foodie bug. "I loved learning about all the various cheeses," Cantelmo says. "How cheese was made and what gave each cheese its distinct flavor fascinated me." Cantelmo's curiosity led her to take classes with some of North Ameri- ca's premier artisan and farmstead cheese makers. Over the next 10 years, she learned from Margaret Peters- Morris of Glengarry Cheesemaking in Canada, made goat's milk cheese with Gianaclis Caldwell of Pholia Farm in Oregon, produced sheep's milk cheese with Larry and Linda Faillace at Three Shepherds Farm in Vermont, and consulted with world-renowned cheese maker Peter Dixon. She learned about milk sources, separating curds and whey, microbial cultures and ren- net (an enzyme used to coagulate milk), salting and brining, hygiene and sanitation, and the cheese ag- ing and ripening process. Cantelmo had an opportunity three years ago to return to the North Shore and work with cheese maker Arlene Brokaw at Apple- ton Farms in Ipswich, where the cheese is made from the milk of the farm's Jersey cows and sold through the farm's dairy store. When Brokaw moved to Maine, Cantelmo was promoted to head cheese maker. Today, she produces four types of cheese—three hard and one soft—in the former bull barn turned cheese kitchen, which today is reminiscent of a sterile laboratory. With a joyful, serene aura, Can- telmo explains the cheese making process, pointing out the pipeline Clockwise, cheese maker Anna Cantelmo; dairy manager Scott Rowe; calves are named at birth; separating curds from whey; churning the milk Growing up in Newburyport, Appleton Farms' cheese maker Anna Cantelmo explains food was never a focus in her household. In fact, she describes it as almost an annoyance. It was more about fast and easy than artisanal and fresh—there were more important things to do than worry about where food came from. "It's funny, both my brother and I now have careers that center on food—where it's from and how it's made," she says. (Her brother David Coman-Hindy is a vegan activist and the executive director for the Humane League, a national farm animal protection nonprofit.)