Maine Artisan Bread Fair and Trade Show Aug 1

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The first annual Bread Fair will be in Skowhegan on Saturday, August 1st, from 10 am to 2 pm. Live music, fired-up ovens producing samples of bread made from Maine grains, and tables offering the accoutrement of bread pleasure and production – books, tools, small farm equipment, cheese, jams, grains, and flour – will invite ever more people to consider the good reasons for supporting local foods.

The Fair will be held in conjunction with the 2009 Kneading Conference in Skowhegan (July 30 and 31st), and the organizers are looking for local cheesemakers who would like to participate in the Fair, which will be free and open to the public.

Contact coordinator Wendy Hebb ([email protected]) before June 22nd if you would like to sign up, or for more information.

Does Cheese Cause Global Warming?

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The methane that cows (and other ruminants) emit while they digest their food is 20 times better at trapping heat in our atmosphere than CO2 — as a result, when Stoneyfield Farms commissioned a study on their company’s carbon footprint, they were shocked to find out that milk made more of an impact on global climate change than transportation, heating, or the energy used to run their plants.

Luckily, scientists are studying whether this must always be the case, and have now found that feeding cows a diet of flax and alfalfa (instead of corn and soy) reduces methane production significantly — and their coats are shiny too!

Maine Cheese Guild

Maine Cheese Guild Quality Statement

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The Maine Cheese Guild believes that cheese of the highest quality can only be made with a thorough and regularly refreshed knowledge of food safety.

The Maine Cheese Guild promotes and sponsors regular opportunities to learn about best practices for cheese making. The Guild also believes that the best way for professional* cheese makers to guarantee the quality of their product is by being appropriately licensed by the Maine Department of Agriculture, as only licensed cheese makers are legally allowed to sell cheese to the public, and only licensed cheese makers receive feedback from the dairy regulatory unit through regular testing for contamination and facility inspections. This feedback is critical, together with on-going education, in maintaining the high quality of award-winning Maine cheese.

* professional = selling cheese to the public