Baron Bigod is a soft, cow’s milk, Brie-de-Meaux style cheese, lovingly made by Fen Farm Dairy in Bungay, Suffolk, in the UK. It is a true UK farmhouse cheese, meaning that the cheese is made on the farm itself.
Jonny Crickmore is the third generation of his family to farm the land at Fen Farm in Suffolk and started helping out his father Graham at the age of just 4. Jonny and his wife Dulcie have turned his father’s thriving dairy farm into a pioneering cheese and butter making business and continue to lovingly care for their herd of Montbeliarde cattle alongside their hardworking team.
Montbeliarde cattle are an ancient breed that originate from the Jura region of France. The current cows at Fen Farm were hand selected by Jonny from small farms in Jura, specifically to create a British ‘Brie’. The cows have a lower milk yield than most breeds but produce a very protein rich, high quality milk which is ideal for cheesemaking. Certain French cheeses, including Vacherin Mont d’Or, Comté and Reblochon are all made exclusively from this particular milk.
The cows graze on a variety of grasses that grow on the grazing land of Stow Fen, an unusually wildlife-rich basin marsh with kingfishers, otters, herons and water voles, which is completely unique to the Waveney River Valley. From November to March, the marshland can get flooded, so the cows live in huge open sided straw barns, eating a home grown diet of maize, hay and grass.
Fen Farm take climate responsibility very seriously and are aiming to become carbon negative in the near future. Currently 70% of the energy used on the farm and in the dairy comes from renewable sources, including their 200kw solar panel system (with battery storage) and a revolutionary cow-dung powered heat exchange system. Cow dung releases huge amounts of heat as it breaks down so Fen Farm have laid two miles of water pipes under the cow’s yard. Cold water heats to 40°C simply by passing through the pipes, and then picks up more waste heat from their fridges and rapid cooling system. It then only takes a tiny amount of solar energy to heat the water to 90°C for cleaning.
The carbon footprint of free range cows is significantly lower than their barn kept counterparts. Less food has to be grown for them and there are very few food miles involved, when even their winter feed is home grown.
Fen Farm are also currently regenerating over 60 acres of ex arable land, in the form of naturally developed meadowland and young native oak forest, by letting nature completely take its course in this vast area.