Oaklands Farm

The town of Gardiner’s best kept secret: Oaklands Farm is located on the historic Gardiner Estate. For context, the founder of the town of Gardiner, Silvester Gardiner, established the town in the 1700s and his descendents have maintained the family's estate ever since. The current descendents of the Gardiner family are no longer active farmers, but are still invested in the Oaklands property continuing to be an agricultural space, so they've made a rather unusual deal to achieve this goal. Kristian, the head cheesemaker and farmer, was hired by the family from all the way out in South Carolina not just to come up to maintain the property and livestock, but also to bring up his entire flock of goats and sheep to use in their burgeoning cheese program!

Right now, the only cheese that Oaklands puts out is Roxanne, which is a bit unusual and hard to categorize. This is actually done on purpose! Kristian's goal in creating the recipe for Roxanne was to create a cheese that is both accessible and distinctly Maine. It's a firm cow's milk cheese that is rubbed with olive oil and sumac foraged from the farm property! Most folks in Western cuisine do not realize that sumac comes in many more flavors other than poison, but the edible variety is often used in Middle Eastern cuisine in things like za'atar seasoning to lend a lemony, herbal taste to things, lending Roxanne its unique flavor! Not only is Roxanne pretty affordable, it's meant to be a tasty crowd-pleaser. So check out your local food co-ops for a wedge today!