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Here’s another one from Gwen Schantz, who was down in my neck of the woods awhile back on her search for good food on the road. She even made a video about this lovely creamery. Enjoy!

Recently I visited Baltimore, MD, where I was hosted by my good friend and fellow natural foods enthusiast, Emily. The two of us headed out to the Waverly Farmers’ Market, a small but richly stocked market in the eastern part of the city. Every Saturday morning, vendors gather here to sell locally produced foods like honey and preserves, and farm-fresh vegetables that grow year-round in the warm Mid-Atlantic climate.

The market also has a large meat and dairy stand where Emily and I picked up some milk and cream cheese to take home for breakfast. The milk and cheese were both so fabulously delicious and fresh that I found myself compelled to visit the farm that produced them, so a few days later on my way out of town I took a bit of a detour out to the Maryland countryside and hunted down the source of my dairy delight.

Rural Maryland is a truly beautiful place, with rolling hills and old farm fields that sprawl for miles in every direction. But as I drove it soon became clear that the Maryland landscape is changing. Farmland that was once covered with grazers and crops is now suffering from a severe and sprawling disease: the housing development.

Happily, the Eat Well Guide led me to one of Maryland’s bucolic strongholds and last remaining dairies: South Mountain Creamery. Founded in 1981 by Randy Sowers and his wife, this relatively young establishment is a bastion of centuries-old family farming traditions. The farm covers about 165 acres, including pastureland and corn fields (they grow their own feed corn for the cows), as well as an additional 50 acres that the Sowers family civil war has protected under a civil war easement. With the exception of the trucks and tractors, this farm doesn’t look much different than it did a century and a half ago when gray and blue-clad soldiers marched and fought across its fields.

And the cows seem to like it that way. South Mountain’s 200 Holsteins are naturally-raised (without hormones or antibiotics), and they spend the summer out on pasture. The rich and creamy milk that they produce is processed in a small facility on-site, which allows the Sowers family to control the quality of their products at every stage – from milking the cows, to making the butter, cheese, milk and ice cream, to delivering it to their customers and selling it at the farmers market. Visitors can also pick up South Mountain dairy goods at the farm’s on-site store, which is run by one of the Sowers daughters and offers a variety of other foods locally-produced foods, including bread, locally-roasted coffee from Zeke’s, and McCutcheon’s preserves. At the store you can also find fresh chicken, pork, lamb and beef from other small farms in the region – a good sign that Maryland’s farming traditions are alive and well.

After visiting the cows and chatting with farmer Randy for a bit, I picked up some smoked cheddar, a jug of milk, a loaf of bread and some Zeke’s fair trade coffee for the road. Needless to say, the next day’s breakfast was one to remember.