The Sweet Spot!
THE FARMSTEAD CREAMERY SHOP AT HIGH LAWN FARM HAS A DREAM TEAM— AND EVEN DREAMIER ICE CREAM
By Liam Gorman // Photos By David Edgecomb
AFTER 100 YEARS, there’s bound to be a few standout moments for a farm that has so much history. But the most recent addition has put High Lawn Farm on the map for more than its milk.
Sarah Spencer, retail operations manager at The Farmstead Creamery Shop, is all smiles—possibly because High Lawn recently added an ice cream trailer to its operation!
The Farmstead Creamery Shop at High Lawn is the go-to spot for locally sourced ice cream. Made on the farm with the key ingredient derived from the Jersey cattle grazing right there in the fields, the sweet treat has quickly become a favorite of Berkshirites and visitors alike.
“Best I’ve ever had,” says 10-year-old Callum Thomas from Blandford, who alternates licking from a cone and “mooing” to the cows that curiously look back at him.
On a summer day, it’s not unusual to see a line 20 people deep waiting to get a taste of the latest fun flavor on the ice cream menu. Since opening the shop three years ago, High Lawn has introduced a wide variety of taste sensations that include Coffee Oreo, Coconut Macaroon, Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip, Pineapple Inside-Out Cake, and Lavender and Lemon Poppyseed, to name a few.
What are the ingredients to their success?
For one thing, the setting is spectacular. The shop sits beside a Bavarian-style water tower atop a hill overlooking a pasture that is often filled with grazing cows. The creamery is a complete sensory experience—you can interact with the animals, sample products in the store, take in the distinct aroma of the farm, and enjoy a beautiful view.
For Specialty Foods Operations Manager Amye Gulezian and creative director Matt Schweizer, the true secret to success can only be one thing, they say. “It’s the Jerseys.”
“The Jersey cows we have here are not your average dairy cows,” continues Gulezian. “The fat globules and the protein concentrates in Jersey milk is a lot higher. Our Jersey herd is typically around 6-1/2 percent average in fat, which is 3 percent higher than Holsteins.
Although the cream might be the distinguishing ingredient, the team behind the cream deserves to be recognized.
Trained at the Culinary Institute of America, Schweizer has been working with dairy for years as a cheesemonger. When he started with High Lawn, he was asked to help diversify their offerings because of changes in the market demands. Milk sales have been going down steadily for years, replaced by almond milks and other alternatives.
Gulezian’s journey to the farm began as a child. “When I was eight or nine, I start- ed doing a summer camp on a dairy farm. That changed my life,” she says. “I started working there when I was 14. When I was in school, I was studying dairy farming and herd management and the cattle side of things. I quickly realized how much I love cheese and dairy products and got into the production side of things.”
The retail side of the dairy business didn’t click for her until a stint working at a fancy Beverly Hills cheese shop. “It was my first job that wasn’t on a farm,” says Gulezian, “so I went from taking care of animals, to literally having celebrities buying cheese from me. One of the things that I took away from that is how disconnected people are from their food.”
At High Lawn Farm, Gulezian is able to bring both aspects of the business together—working with the animals and helping connect people with the food they produce.
“I now get to be in a role where I talk to people about that with an understand- ing of the animal side and with an understanding of the food production side,” says Gulezian. “We have a farm where the public can come and visit and learn about what we do and ask questions and take photos and experience our products firsthand.”
Not only does the public get an education, they give her and Schweizer an education in the form of feedback. “The cool thing with having the store is that we can test drive a few individual flavors there and immediately get feedback from our customers,” says Gulezian. “I think the community likes being a part of that.”
And they want as much feedback as they can get with new flavors frequently hitting the menu. “I usually look at what’s in season, and then I start to write out a few different flavors and run them by Amye,” says Schweizer.
Gulezian interrupts him with a smile. “When he says a few flavors, he means 50 to 70 ideas.”
For some, the creative process can be painful. But for team High Lawn, it sounds pretty delicious. ”Sometimes, I’m eating ice cream at 7 a.m. Our job is to eat ice cream; I feel very lucky,” laughs Gulezian.“It’s always fun, but it’s hard work, getting a product to a point where it can be sold. It is a huge team effort every single day. You’ve got people who work so, so hard to keep the animals happy and to keep our customers happy and to keep each other excited about what we do every day.”
For Schweizer, the sweet life is simple. “When you have a pint of ice cream at home, it’s delicious. But it tastes a little more delicious in a cone at the shop, looking out at a beautiful vista and the cows who made it.”