The Center for Dairy Research (CDR) and Dairy Farmers of Wisconsin (DFW) are excited to announce the 2025 graduating class of the Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker® program. This year’s class includes seven new and two returning Master cheesemakers.
“Each new class of graduates confirms the value of the Master Cheesemaker program to our state and the Wisconsin dairy industry.” said John Jaeggi, program coordinator. “The Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker® program is the only one of its kind in the United States, which further strengthens Wisconsin’s reputation as the premier cheesemaking state.”
To be eligible for the Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker® program, cheesemakers must be licensed Wisconsin cheesemakers for at least 10 years. Before applicants are accepted into the program, they are required to complete CDR’s Advanced Cheesemaking Short Course and one other workshop of their choice. In addition, applicants undergo a plant visit where they lead a walkthrough of their facility and must pass an oral exam.
Once they are accepted into the program, participants complete a list of courses and an intensive exam. In addition, the cheeses they are being certified in are graded for flavor, composition and microbial analysis— this is done three times before they can graduate as a Master cheesemaker. All said, it takes about three years to complete, and, in the end, once successful, the cheesemaker earns the honor and respect of becoming a Master cheesemaker as well as the right to use the Master Mark® on their products.
Ken Carothers has always been driven by a passion for learning and improving his craft. In 2010, he started a part-time sanitation position at Agropur’s plant in Little Chute. From there, he transferred to the intake department and then onto production where he started to help make cheese. In 2012, Carothers earned his Wisconsin cheesemaker license. As part of that process, he took a cheesemaking course.
“I found the course very interesting,” Carothers said. “It ignited a spark. I wanted to learn more about what goes into cheesemaking. I started to see that it’s more of an art than just a repetitive process.”
Soon after obtaining his Wisconsin cheesemaker license, he moved into a supervisory role at Agropur, obtained a pasteurizer license, and started taking short courses at CDR.
“I was just trying to continuously grow my knowledge base throughout the years,” Carothers said. “It was kind of nice taking that approach. I could learn new things in class and then apply them right away in the plant.”
Carothers didn’t necessarily set out to be a Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker®, but as he moved up in the industry and continued taking those CDR short courses, he saw that the title of Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker® was a possibility.
“Probably year seven or eight [at Agropur], I realized it wasn’t that far out of reach anymore,” he said. “That’s when I started to make sure I’d have the required courses to be accepted into the program.”
Fast forward several years, and Carothers is a brand-new Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker® with a certification in Mozzarella.
“It’s a proud accomplishment. It’s something I don’t take lightly,” he said. “It’s not something that they just hand out.”
Carothers has continued to grow in the industry. He is now an operational excellence manager, meaning that he provides technical support to several Agropur plants to help guide them through all the challenges with process and cheesemaking.
One of those plants is a new cheesemaking plant that Agropur opened in 2023 in Little Chute. It produces string and stick Mozzarella cheese. Carothers said the learning required to complete the Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker® program is especially helpful and relevant as plants become more automated.
“As we continue to progress with technology and automation, it’s harder to fully understand everything that goes into cheesemaking,” he said. “Here [at the Little Chute plant], we don’t see the cheese until it pretty much hits the brine…With automation there can be some lack of understanding, and I think the Master program helps reinforce what goes into cheesemaking.”
The knowledge and expertise of the Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker® program has already helped the Little Chute plant. In 2024, the first year that the plant produced string cheese, Carothers and his mentor and Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker®, Tom Blauert, entered their string cheese into the 2024 World Championship Cheese Contest. They were pleasantly surprised to win first and second places in the string cheese category.
“At the time, we were more curious as to where we would land. We just kind of wanted to get a baseline,” Carothers said. “Then we got the result. That was a proud plant accomplishment.”
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