Quesos Cerrón’s history dates back to 1987, when Juana Garcia and Juan Jose, a young couple, began making small batch goat’s milk cheeses in the basement of their family home in Fuente-Álamo, following Juana’s mother’s traditional cheese making methods. At the time, huge numbers of young people were leaving rural areas, causing a depopulation crisis, so they decided to stand up to the issue and launch a business, guided by their love of goat’s cheese and commitment to animal welfare. The dairy continues to be run by Juana and Juan, and their three children.
Quesos Cerrón make different cheeses at different times of the year to showcase the varying flavours in the goat’s milk. Young, fresh cheeses are made and sold in the summer, whereas autumn and winter milk, which has a higher concentration of fat and protein, has greater ripening potential, so goes into their aged cheeses. In the winter, the goat’s feed on hardy herbs such as thyme and rosemary, and it can take 2-3 years for these flavours to reach their full aromatic potential. The aged cheeses are also washed with virgin Olive Oil every week as they mature, to enhance their flavour.
Juana, Juan and their family, many years later, remain committed to showcasing the very best of Spanish cheese, using only local, organic, high quality milk from their own farm. Their goats graze on fresh grass, cereals, herbs and wild forage grown on the farm.
Quesos Cerrón’s farm is entirely organic and they compost all livestock waste and dairy waste so that it can be reintroduced into the earth. They are also working on self sustaining energy to ensure the long term protection of the environment.
Organically reared animals are protected so are guaranteed a huge amount of space, access to pasture and as much time outside as possible. Organic standards also ban the routine use of antibiotics and wormers and instead ensure that animals have ample space to roam, which naturally reduces stress and disease and removes the need to use them in the first place. Organic fed goats cannot be fed GM animal feed so their carbon footprint is much lower than barn kept goats as food doesn’t need to be grown for them elsewhere and so there are very few, if any, food miles involved in their feeding. Farms run under these organic standards also see a vast increase in biodiversity on site.