Andy & Matteo Kehler

2025

K. Dun Gifford “Local Hero” Award

Co-Recipients*

Mateo and Andy Kehler In 1998, Andy and Mateo Kehler bought the “old Jasper Hill farm” in Greensboro, Vermont – the Northeast Kingdon. They set out to create a model for small-scale dairy farming that could offer more opportunities for Vermont’s working landscape. The concept was called value-added agriculture: the practice of transforming a raw material like milk into something more valuable before it leaves the farm. This is the award-winning Jasper Hill artisan cheeses. Jasper Hill’s mission is to make the highest possible quality products in a way that supports Vermont’s working landscape. Andy and Mateo are driven to be the standard bearer of quality and innovation in the artisan cheese industry while promoting their regional taste of place.

They are Local Heros, to be sure.

This year’s awardees of the K. Dun Gifford Local Hero Award were special to Dun Gifford.

In March 2000, Oldways, the American Cheese Society, Whole Foods Market, and the Cheese Importers Association joined forces to assemble an international coalition to fight to preserve the rights of individuals to choose raw milk cheeses. The new coalition was called the Cheese of Choice Coalition, and the four organizations worked together to fight the proposed FDA ban on raw milk cheeses; The FDA threatened to lengthen the aging time for raw milk cheeses from 60 days to 120 or more days – thereby banning most raw milk cheeses. The collective work was effective, and today, the 60-day aging rule on raw milk cheeses still stands. 

Artisan Cheesemakers Mateo and Andy Kehler and scientific expert Catherine Donnelly were important partners in the success of this effort, working with Dun Gifford, and *together they are joint recipients of the 2025 K. Dun Gifford “Local Hero” Award.