Is this Italy? No, it's Vermont.

BENNINGTON, Vt. -- Four years ago, Michael Scheps was working the counter at Al Ducci's Italian Pantry, the popular gourmet shop owned by his father, Al Scheps, in nearby Manchester. ''Who's next?" he asked the crowd of customers, and Johann (pronounced ''Joanne") Englert stepped up. She bought some of the fresh mozzarella balls that Michael Scheps spent his mornings making. What happened after that small transaction would change the course of his future. Englert, a retired schoolteacher and real estate agent from Boston with a second house in the area, tasted and loved the cheese, and she thought she might be able to convince other stores to carry it. She left with 10 pieces.

The cheese was impeccably fresh, faintly briny, and almost sweet, she says. ''It had a beautiful shiny finish, it was attractive, it wasn't floating in water," says Englert, who had often enjoyed fresh mozzarella in Italy with her Venetian mother and rarely found its equivalent in this region. Within a week, she had convinced 10 Boston-area stores to carry the cheese. The next week she took 20 balls, and after that 60. Soon Scheps was staying after hours to keep up with her orders. Within a year, he and Englert decided to go into business, and Maplebrook Farm was begun, offering ''handmade mountain mozzarella."

Now in its fourth year, Maplebrook is located in a warehouse here. There are no cows in sight, so it's not really a farm. Scheps, 43, is the tireless cheese maker at the helm, Englert the relentless marketer. Within a year of startup, the two managed to turn a profit on 60,000 balls of mozzarella; last year, they made 234,000. The cheese goes onto pies at Belmont's Stone Hearth Pizza, and it's sold at most Whole Foods markets. In the coming summer months, the partners expect to produce some 350,000 balls of handmade cheese to satisfy customers' hunger for traditional mozzarella and tomato salads. ''Once those tomatoes come out of the ground, forget it!" says Scheps.

Compactly built and genial, Scheps is a third-generation Sicilian-American cheese maker whose grandfather had a mozzarella plant in northern New Jersey. The grandson has insisted on making cheese as he was taught: by hand, in small batches of 10 or 12 balls at a time. For a modern enterprise, Maplebrook is distinctly Old World. ''There's nothing automatic," says Scheps. ''The only thing that we have that runs on electricity here is our hot water system and refrigeration -- to heat the cheese and to cool it. In between, everything is done by hand." Englert notes how striking the silence is in the facility. You can hear only the sounds of half a dozen workers concentrating on their jobs.

Compared with the arcane techniques used to create aged artisanal cheese, the process of making fresh mozzarella is relatively straightforward. Though Scheps learned as a boy how to transform milk into curd for mozzarella, he buys raw curd from a premium supplier in Wisconsin. ''It's what we do with it when we get it here that makes the difference," he says. He checks the curd's age, temperature, and pH, perhaps setting ''green" curd aside for a few days to temper or ripen.

When the blocklike curd is ready, Scheps or one of his cheese makers forces it through a wire cutter, yielding even slices. These go into a metal bowl filled with water at exactly 160 degrees. Cheese makers gently knead the curd and shape it into balls. How long do they knead it? ''Until it's ready," says Scheps. Like many artisans, he can't quantify his art.

Two cold water baths follow, cooling the young cheeses down to 41 degrees. A highly saturated -- but brief -- salt bath is next. Scheps uses Atlantic sea salt, which he feels gives his mozzarella the best taste. Finally, workers wrap and label the mozzarella, twisting and folding the plastic securely around each ball by hand.

The finished balls cool in the refrigerator. A few batches each week are lightly smoked over cherry-wood chips.

Stone Hearth Pizza was one of Maplebrook's first customers. Chef and general manager Michael Ehlenfeldt describes the taste and texture of the cheese as unusual for a cow's milk product, with some of the qualities of real Italian mozzarella di bufala (which is made from buffalo milk). The chef says that when Maplebrook mozzarella is melted for pizza, it has a ''rich, creamy, smooth flavor -- almost nutty when it comes out of the oven. And it's a very consistent product." Ehlenfeldt uses it in fresh salads, too. ''Some of the very best food is simple, from clean, wonderful ingredients. Any time I pair ingredients with the fresh mozzarella, I think along those lines so the quality of the cheese can really come through."

When Englert first began marketing the cheese, she would drive samples to stores throughout the Northeast and wordlessly place a plate of sliced cheese in front of buyers. ''The cheese speaks for itself," she says. Englert shuttles among the plant in Bennington, her house in neighboring West Dover, and her residence on Beacon Hill, where she lives with husband, Charles; she also still does the door-to-door sales.

Even with the rapid growth of Maplebrook, the partners intend to keep working as a small company, adding more sinks and training more cheese makers rather than automating the process. As a result, the little plant in the Bennington hills is turning into a cheese school of sorts. Scheps has labored to share the skill he learned at his father's side. ''What else are you going to do?" says the son. ''You can't put an ad in the paper looking for an Italian handmade mozzarella maker. I mean, we're in Vermont! Not going to get a lot of applications."

One local success is Bennington native Norman Robinson, 34, who started out as the company's first employee, wrapping cheeses for market. He has since become a cheese maker himself, and a manager training others in the craft. ''Mike and Johann are really good to work for. It's more or less like a family environment. I was here right at the start, and it's been really nice to watch it grow. I plan on being there forever."

The emphasis on hand labor means a slightly higher price ($9.95 per pound, or $7 to $8 per ball, depending on weight), yet Maplebrook has faced no real competition. Although a number of grocers in the North End make their own mozzarella by hand, no comparable mozzarella has made its way into regional-scale distribution.

That means long days for the cheese makers. Starting at 5 a.m. each Monday, Scheps and his crew begin filling orders. They continue each day until the week's orders are complete. Then they stop. ''At the end of the week," says Scheps, ''we don't have a pound of cheese in stock. I don't want to hear that there's 50 cases sitting in a warehouse somewhere and it's called fresh mozzarella."

Over in Manchester, Scheps's father, Al, is making the mozzarella for Al Ducci's by himself. The senior Scheps also began his career watching his father make cheese. Al Scheps is proud that his son has gone into business on his own. And what does he think of his son's cheese? ''It's very good," says the dad. ''Next to mine" -- he hesitates -- ''it's comparable."

Maplebrook Farm mozzarella is available at most Whole Foods markets and A. Russo & Sons, 560 Pleasant St., Watertown, 617-923-1500; for information go to www.mountainmozzarella.com.