A journey filled with fun and passion for making delicious things.

Allison Lakin, cheesemaker, started out as a cum laude anthropology graduate from the prestigious Cornell University in “gorges” Ithaca, New York. But after putting her degree and her talents to use in Maritime Museums, in 2002 she found herself drawn to, and fascinated by, cheesemaking. And so her journey began.

She started out on a farm in  New York state, where she made three varieties of aged cow’s milk cheese and fresh ricotta. While she was learning on the job, she also enrolled in the University of Wisconsin Cheese Short Course and workshops with renowned cheesemakers Peter Dixon and Kathy Biss to learn more about the chemistry and art of cheesemaking. The semi-hard cheeses she made while still learning the craft,  placed 15th and 32nd in the World Championship Cheese contest in 2003 and in 2004, her ricotta won Third place in the American Cheese Society competition.

In 2005 she was invited to speak at the joint conference for the Association for Food and Human Values Society (AFHVS) and the Association for the Study of Food and Society (ASFS). 

Then in August of 2011 she founded Lakin’s Gorges Cheese, naming the company to recognize her love of beauty of Ithaca. She became a Maine-licensed cheesemaker and went to work creating her line of creamy, rich cheeses.  She moved to her own facility in Waldoboro in 2016 and as of 2022 is making the cheese exclusively with her own cows milk.

In 2016, Downeast Magazine named Lakin’s Gorges Cheese the Editor’s Choice for Best Cheesemaker. In 2019, Yankee Magazine named her Rockweed cheese one of the 10 Best Foods in New England. In 2022, Rockweed won Best in Class in the Soft Ripened, Flavored category of the World Championship Cheese Contest.

Here are Allison’s not-for-the-faint-of heart “Eight Easy Steps to get from Working at Maritime Museums to Becoming a Master Cheesemaker.”  

1. Learn to cook salmon on cedar stakes around an alder wood fire

2. Graduate cum laude in Anthropology from Cornell University

3. Research food preservation for Polynesian voyages for Tommy Holmes’ planned Pacific Canoe Museum

4. Take a four-month, cross-country road trip eating blue road roadside fry bread in New Mexico, out-the-back banana pudding in Georgia, speed eating crawfish in Biloxi, Mississippi

5. Work at Mystic Seaport Museum demonstrating open hearth cooking in the Buckingham Hall House and “Mug Ups” cooked over a coal burning stove aboard the Schooner LA Dunton

6. Make cheese in New York State, with cheese classes at the University of Wisconsin, West Highland Dairy cheesemaker Kathy Biss and artisan cheesemaker Peter Dixon.

7. Create programs that blend food and art at the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art

8. Take a leap of faith in self and the universe

Number eight wouldn’t have been possible without the perpetual encouragement from her mother; generosity of spirit of Cathe Morrill of State of Maine Cheese Co.; and the businesses which, for the love of quality food and a sincere desire to assist a new venture, welcomed the cheese.

Thanks, too, must be given to the Maine Department of Agriculture (specifically Diane Perry and Audrey Slattery), Coastal Enterprises Inc. Small Business Assistance,  MaineStream Finance and the Maine public library system.

Allison’s gratitude to all who helped her on this journey and to her customers is infinite.