The Story Behind Herkkujuustola

I’ve always been an adventurer – it’s in my soul and in my heart. Still, I could never have imagined what life had in store: how a Swiss truck driver, transporting loads across Europe and Central Asia, would end up calling this place – Finland, and more specifically, our very own cheesery – home.

Although I grew up surrounded by cheese in Switzerland thanks to my father’s profession, the open road pulled me in as a young man. But life has a funny way of turning things around: your true calling will always catch up with you, no matter how far you go. In the late 1990s, I was struck by a great tragedy – I lost my friend who had joined me on my journey from Switzerland across Europe…

The immense loss left me feeling lost between life’s many highways. And yet, fate had one more surprise in store – a signpost more charming and unexpected than any before: my wife, Jenni, whom I met at the local market in Häijää.

As I said, your calling finds you. In Finland, I started to long for the cheeses of my homeland – those delicious, emotional masterpieces I had learned to appreciate and understand as both a cheesemaker and a cheesemaker’s son…

I’ve always been an adventurer. And in some way or another, I’ve also always been a cheesemaker – just like my father. That makes me a happy man. Where someone else might simply see a vacuum-packed piece of cheese in a store display, I’m lucky enough to know the exciting story behind it.

That’s why I’m proud to share this little secret with you: the cheese you’re looking at has been lovingly and carefully cared for over the course of many months. It has been brushed, turned, lifted, and rotated dozens – sometimes hundreds – of times. It’s precise, emotional work…

But what matters most is the human touch and presence. When you give things enough time and care, the result will always be something uniquely wonderful. That’s what cheese – and life – is all about.

Peter Dörig, Cheesemaster