The Field Guideby Moss & MarrowBiologische Kaasboerderij, De Ruyge Weyde
- Cattle, sheep or goats graze on pasture in the grazing season
- No synthetic pesticides or fertiliser (certified)
De Ruyge Weyde is an organic cheese farm on the Ruige Weide polder road in Oudewater, where a family in its fifth generation milks about 50 Fleckvieh cows and has made Gouda boerenkaas (raw-milk farm cheese) from their milk since 1847.
The cheese is made from fresh raw milk that is never homogenised, skimmed, thermised, pasteurised or bactofugated, and without calcium chloride, nitrate or natamycin. It is sold from young to 1000 days old, plus cumin, clove and other flavoured cheeses. The cows are all born on the farm and graze from about April to November in the meadows around it and on Staatsbosbeheer nature land; in winter they eat mainly grass silage and hay, with organic concentrate that contains no soy or GMO feed. Calves stay with their mothers for about seven days in a straw pen beside the milking robot. Once a month one of their own cattle is slaughtered at a butcher in Reeuwijk, and the beef is sold vacuum-packed and frozen. The farm is certified organic (SKAL); we found it in the register.
The farm shop opens Monday to Saturday from 9:00 to 18:00. The cheese is also posted from their webshop, cut and vacuum-packed to order, and sold by cheese specialists, mainly in the Randstad.
About a quarter of the herd gives A2 milk, though the farm breeds for the casein types best suited to cheesemaking.