Something to say cheese about

Dairy farming brothers find a new way to make their milk profitable

Demand often exceeds supply of delicate, artisanal Hannahbells cheeses made at Shy Brothers Farm. (Wendy Maeda/Globe Staff)

SOUTH DARTMOUTH - In many ways, the story of Karl Santos and his three brothers and the Westport farm that has been in their family for three generations is typical of what is happening to other dairy farmers in New England.

The Santos brothers - Karl is one of two sets of twins - realized they had to do something besides milk cows because they were losing money on milk sales. For them, the solution is Hannahbells, delicate artisanal cow's milk cheeses produced here. Each is shaped like a small sewing thimble, about 1 inch high; demand often outpaces the 13,000 pieces produced weekly. The cheeses are featured at Oleana in Cambridge, L'Espalier in Back Bay, and sold at specialty markets in Boston, Rhode Island, and New York.

A quiet man, Karl Santos is the cheese maker and managing partner of the business. He and his twin brother and the other set of twins are so reticent that they're known as the "shy brothers." Now, the venture is called Shy Brothers Farm. Karl and his twin, Kevin, both 43, and older brothers Arthur and Norman, 48, took over the farm from their father in 1990.

"For quite a few years, financially it was barely making it," says Karl. Milking had become a rarity in south coastal Massachusetts. Only four dairies are still operating in the area amid pressure to sell land for real estate development. "In 2006, I lost money on the farm," Santos says. With low milk prices, he says, he knew that they would have to find a way to save the land.

They considered ideas that other dairies have turned to, including ice cream. On the advice of Barbara Hanley, chairwoman of the Bristol County Conservation District, the brothers settled on cheese. Getting from that decision to making intriguingly flavored little cheeses is a tale of an admittedly reserved farmer venturing far from his comfort zone.

The cheeses, made from the milk of their 140 Holstein cows, are named Hannahbells after their late mother (her name was Hannah and they added the word bells because of the bell shape). The cows graze on pasture on a peninsula between two branches of the Westport River, close to the Atlantic Ocean. The animals receive no antibiotics or hormones.

Neither Karl Santos nor Hanley knew anything about making cheese. But Hanley loves France, so they decided to go there to explore French cheeses. For Karl, it was not only his first passport and his first time out of the country, it was also his first train trip - on the high speed TGV from Paris to Lyon. The two traveled through a wide swath of France, from the French Alps to Burgundy, meeting cheese makers who were generous with their help.

In Burgundy, which reminded them of the flat land of their own region, they met women producing cheese in small thimble shapes. "These gals made a delicious boutons de culotte - literally trouser buttons," says Hanley, for serving as a nibble before dinner with sparkling wines or cocktails. Though the traditional boutons de culotte is made from goat's milk, the women were using Holsteins crossed with Ayrshires, similar to the Santoses' herd. Hanley, a former golf course consultant who still speaks with the honeyed accents of her native Alabama, says at first she didn't realize they were onto something. But Karl Santos, she says, knew right away. "We thought bite-size [cheeses] would be a niche," he says.

Back home, the work began. The brothers had sold their life insurance policies and Hanley and her husband, Leo Brooks, put in money to raise the $150,000 they needed to begin. Seventy percent of the cheese making operation is owned by the four brothers, the remainder by Hanley and Brooks.

Karl Santos began reading extensively, he and Hanley took classes, and they purchased equipment and molds from France. Then they learned by trial and error. Santos explains that much of the work is straightforward, but very labor-intensive, a seven-days-a-week job - not unfamiliar to a lifelong dairy farmer. Some of the equipment is very high tech; other pieces are simple. Milk is piped into vats in a retrofitted building that was once a slaughterhouse. Karl concentrates on cheese while the other brothers keep up the dairy operation; they're still selling their milk. Hanley handles marketing and deliveries.

The company sells the cheeses for $6.50 to $7.90 for 4 to 5 ounces. "People think it's going to be a cute little cheese," says Hanley, "but it has a bigger arc than that." The cheeses come plain, and flavored with chipotle, shallot, and a delicate lavender.

Slighty tangy but creamy in the middle, Hannahbells take five days to mold, says Santos. After pasteurizing milk, adding rennet, and draining it, the cheese is put into molds and held for 24 hours. On the fifth day, each is removed from the molds and two different cultures are applied to form the outside rind. "That protects it," says Santos, "and also gives it a different flavor." The cheese sits for 24 hours, goes into a drying room for two to four days, then an aging room for a few more.

The cheese maker adjusts for temperature, weather, bacteria in the air, and what the cows are eating. Last September, says Hanley, "we lost five batches." The taste of the cheese was slightly off, and she and Santos didn't want to send anything out that wasn't quite right. They finally surmised that the cows had been eating more clover, throwing the cheese recipe out of whack.

Under a state-funded program, Santos is now helping other farmers learn artisanal cheese making to save their farms.

His cheese enterprise is flourishing, and the farmer may have to reconsider his company's name.

Karl Santos is no longer so shy.

Hannahbells are available at Foodies Urban Market, 1421 Washington St., South End, 617-266-9911 and Verrill Farms,11 Wheeler Road, Concord, 978-369-4494.