Marcoot Jersey Creamery in Greenville, Illinois

One hot afternoon, we decided to venture away from our campground about 20 miles north to visit the Marcoot Jersey Creamery.

This is a small family-owed dairy that has been in operation for seven generations.  The cows are milked twice a day and the milk is used to make cheese, ice cream and yogurt.

All of us were given permission to go into the barn and pet the calves.  As you can tell, the children enjoyed letting the calves suck on their fingers.  I didn't share this experience!

While the cows are being milked, their milk is stored in these containers before it it piped into...

... this holding tank. Next, some of the milk is pasteurized and some of it is left raw to use for "raw milk cheese."

Inside the dairy, we walked down a long hallway with windows overlooking the processing area. There are posters along the wall that explain the cheese-making process. In the store, we purchased some ice cream, and cheese.  The ice cream had the texture of home-churned ice cream and was delicious.  We liked the pasteurized cheese better than the raw milk cheese. The raw milk cheese had more of a bitter aftertaste.

The Marcoot Creamery is open Monday - Saturday but only makes cheese on Wed., Fri., and Saturday. This was a great way to spend a hot afternoon in the country.