Wing Fai & Wendy: 2010 Road Trip Day 3 - Cedar Grove Cheese Factory & National Mustard Museum

We checked out of Sheraton in the morning and drove 30 miles west of Madison to Cedar Grove Cheese Factory. It was about an hour's drive and along the way we saw lots of cows, especially on the road leading to Cedar Grove...

Then, we reached Cedar Grove Cheese Factory, one of the oldest dairies in the area. The cheese they make are without artificial growth hormones (rBGH), animal enzymes, or genetically modified ingredients (GMOs)

We went into the retail store and on the left, you can view behind windows how the cheese is being made. The factory area was not really big and there wasn't a real tour as what it was stated on the website. Initially, we were a little disappointed but we eventually thought that it was worth the trip as the cheese tasted really good! =p

They have a system to naturally clean their waste water before releasing it back to Earth. It is known as The Living Machine and is basically a greenhouse, designed to be a working ecosystem. It uses natural microbes and a collection of hydroponic plants. Waste water is biologically processed back into clean water, and then discharged into Honey Creek...

Inside the Living Machine...

These are the tanks that store the milk brought in from nearby farms...

These are the variety of cheese sold at the retail store. We pondered over the various cheese for a long time, unsure of what to buy. Finally, the lady there told us that we can try samples and we immediately agreed. =p She was very nice and let us tried all the cheese in the sample basket...

The cheese made there were really nice and we could not resist the temptation to buy them. Plus we love cheese! =p We bought cheddar cheese with garlic, medium cheddar cheese, butterkaese and a cow and sheep milk cheese. We loved the butterkaese cheese the moment we tried it! =)

Website: http://my.execpc.com/~cgcheese/index.html

Next, we drove back towards Madison to the National Mustard Museum, located at Middleton, just outside Madison...

The retail shop sells hundreds of variety of mustard. There were sweet-hot, honey, fruit, spirit, etc.

There's even mustard in bottles with the logo of colleges and they are labeled tailgate mustards. We spotted the Purdue bottle... =p

The lower level is a Mustard Museum and there are really lots of mustard from all over the world. These are those from the USA, grouped by the state they are from...