Dairy Farming 10 Minutes Away From the Financial Capital of the World
We’ve known our friends Rolf and Edith for many years now, since we started touring Switzerland with Jeff Wilkinson. (If you don’t know Jeff’s music, here’s your chance: http://www.jeffwilkinsonmusic.com/) Rolf is an incredible graphic designer and an award winning animator. His most recent animation ‘Bolero Station’ is one I guarantee will make you smile! http://www.bolerostation.ch/ He and Jeff actually met back at RISD (Rhode Island School of Design), and even though Rolf is now technically retired, he still has a ton of graphic design work, plus government grants for his next animation, so he is incredibly busy. Edith is a music teacher, who not only teaches keyboards and accordion to students several classes a day, but also happens to be training for the London Marathon in April. So while I’m typing this and eating cheese and drinking wine, Edith is out on a 14k training run, after teaching all day, making us feel lazy again. Before I tell you where I got the cheese… I should mention that we had a delightful afternoon wandering around the city of Bremgarten, which dates back at least to the 1500s. (As an aside, the city of Dietikon, where Rolf and Edith live, is one of only two Swiss cities engraved on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, since it is the site where Napoleon defeated the Russians. Napoleon is responsible for the canton (state) system of Switzerland.) I’ll put some lovely pictures of Bremgarten in here, but it was great to just walk around and see some beautiful, very old buildings, and enjoy the history of the town, even if most of the shops were closed on a Monday. On our way to Bremgarten we stopped at a Landi- a Swiss chain of farm store/garden centers. It was a lot like Tractor Supply, but with a big garden center, a housewares department, and an entire section where you could buy wine and beer! I loved it, and wandered around looking at things, while people stared at me. Speaking of farm stuff… just up the street from Rolf and Edith, about 10 min outside of Zurich by car or train, is an organic dairy farm run by Farmer Fabian. Farmer Fabian has a herd of 25 Brown Swiss cows, and sells organic milk, cheese, and yogurt directly to the community via a 24 HOUR MILK AND CHEESE DISPENSING MACHINE. I made a video of this and plan on posting it soon, because it’s hard to explain in words, even though it’s EXACTLY like it seems: you walk up to a vending machine on the side of the barn, put in your money, and pick the door with your cheese behind it, take the cheese, then the machine gives you change. Same for the milk, although you have to bring your own bottle. You put the bottle under the spout, put the money in, the machine puts fresh milk in your bottle, gives you change, and you take the milk home for breakfast, or dinner, or whatever. WHY CAN’T WE HAVE NICE THINGS LIKE THIS AT HOME?!?!
