Patiently aged cheddar

Group of Tillamook Makers Reserve products

Our secret ingredient? Time.

We’ve been making cheese masterfully for more than a century. When you start with an outstanding recipe and unusually good ingredients, the rest is easy. It just takes time.

New Look
Now Sailing

Over 100 years ago, our farmers built the Morning Star ship to deliver the dairy they loved to the world. Today, it symbolizes the pride we take in carefully crafting our products, like Maker’s Reserve, the best of our cheddars.

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Our Process

The
Tillamook
Way, Since
Way Back

The Tillamook Way is a way of life—the way our farmer-owners have done things since 1909. We cared for our farmer-owners, who cared for the land, which sustained healthier cows, which provided better milk. And better milk made better dairy products. It’s a simple recipe that we’ve followed for over a century and it has never failed.

Swipe

Step 1
It Starts with
Premium Milk
We measure milk using our own internal metrics, beginning with a healthy herd. The welfare of our animals comes first, since we depend on them for clean, high quality milk. Tillamook dairy co-op members take a pledge to honor the natural milk production cycles of their animals. That means not using synthetics like rBST and supplying milk with low SCC (somatic cell count). You can measure the quality of our cheese against those commitments.
Step 2
Rich in fat
rich in flavor
Our targeted high fat-to-protein ratio sets our cheddar apart. Our uniquely high levels of butterfat will dazzle your taste buds and beguile your olfactory senses. Our uniquely high levels of butterfat deliver an unmistakable depth of flavor that you won't find in your average cheddar.
Step 3
Heat-shocked
Thermalized,
not Pasteurized
It’s an important distinction that few cheesemakers of our size can claim. The difference of just a few degrees allows the enzymes and natural flora retained in the milk to add their own singular flavors over time. Sometimes it’s not what you add, but what you leave behind, to do its thing.
Step 4
Add Proprietary Cultures
We select our special blend of cultures and grow them on-site, at the Tillamook Creamery. When they’re combined with the always-changing seasonal flora naturally present in our premium milk, we detect the beginnings of the signature flavors and textures that will characterize each cheddar. Think of it as a Tillamook terroir.
Step 5
Perfect Conditions for Aging
Just as we heat the milk to the perfect temperature for the perfect length of time, we cool our cheddar blocks to the optimal temperature for slow fermentation and aging. Then we wait. Because the only way to get to ten years is ten years.