Standhill Cheesery - The Finest Cheeses of the Borders!
A Special Feature about Jim and Annie Shanks, and their home-run business, Standhill Cheesery - featuring none other than Fatlips Castle Blue Cheese - I've tried it, it's delicious, a wonderful smooth brie like cheese with a slight bitter aftertaste, wonderful to munch on with oatcakes while sitting on the crags!
"We are a farming family. Jim’s father bought the farm in 1951 and brought dairy cows from Lockerbie to Hawick. The Hawick area is not a recognisable dairy area, but through his father’s love of Friesian cows – he was President of the breed society in 1976 – the farm prospered. And now the next generation wants to take on the responsibility of caring and nurturing the continuing generations of these original cows. But what of Jim and Annie? Retirement is not an immediate option, so why not take on the challenge of something new? What about turning the superb milk we have been producing for all these years into a product which can be sold straight to the consumer? Off we go on cheese courses. Lots of hard work converting the old milking parlour into a modern food producing area. And the result – the Roxburgh Roondie and Borders Brie! It’s certainly a different life for Annie who until recently was teaching Business Studies at the local High School in Hawick and Jim is finding it “interesting” working with his wife!
The cheese has been receiving very favourable comments from the buyers at the local farmers markets and it was a columnist in the local Hawick News who described the soft cheese as “as guid as ony of the best bries, very creamy and no ower slittery”! You really can’t beat the local Scots tongue!"
http://www.freewebs.com/jimshanks/
Standhill Farm
Minto
Hawick
Roxburghshire
TD9 8SF
