It’s one of our favorite cheeses – you know, the one with the holes.  For one family-owned cheese company in Millersburg, Ohio, it's been "Swiss only" for more than six decades. 

The day starts early for brothers Robert and Walter Ramseyer in Millersburg. The machines start  whiring before 5 a.m. at the Holmes Cheese Company. By day's end the brothers and their workers will turn out fifty thousand pounds of Swiss cheese. That's six times the volume produced by their father, Swiss immigrant Robert Ramseyer who started the plant in 1941.

He gave me a value for this business. We developed a goal: we wanted to continue to grow this business. —Robert Ramseyer, CEO, Holmes Cheese Company

And grow they have, making this the third largest Swiss cheese company in the state of Ohio.

Ramseyer says the key to good Swiss cheese is in the milk and knowing where it comes from. He gets his from Amish farmer Atlee Yoder.

Holmes County contains the largest Amish population in the country. Many of them work the land using simple, old fashioned farming techniques. Atlee Yoder's been supplying milk to the Ramseyer family for more than ten years. To meet the cheese makers strict standards Yoder had to embrace some modern technology.

Holmes Cheese takes in a ton of milk every other day. That milk is first pasteurized before going into a large vat where special bacterial organisms are introduced to give it that unique Swiss cheese character. A coagulant turns the milk into curd with the consistency of jello.

So nothing goes to waste, what's called the "whey" is drained off of the curd and is dried into protein powder to be used as a substitute for non-fat dried milk.

After eighteen hours in the "press vats" or molding forms, the curd has turned into cheese and is cut into 200-pound blocks and placed in a brine solution. Swiss cheese is aged or “cured” six to eight weeks. It takes four to six  weeks  to create those familiar  holes or "eyes" as their called. That special bacteria produces carbon dioxide gas which forms the holes. Bob’s son, Brian, has to carefully  monitor this important step.

Brian, who always wanted to enter the family business, says curing Swiss cheese to just the right point can be frustrating. "I said, 'you know, Dad, why don't we do something simple like cheddar?'", said Brian, "And he looked at me and said, 'what fun would that be?'". The Ramseyers really enjoy working side by side. Walter’s son, Hans, says it’s about being wholly committed to a family tradition—a tradition that needs to be carried on. And that's good news for thousands of cheese lovers. 

Additional information:
Fun Fact: Hundreds of family farms in Switzerland still churn out the famous cheese as well.

But shoppers will never find a product there called “Swiss cheese.”  If it’s the kind with the holes they want, they have to look for “Emmentaler.”   

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