If you are a cheese lover, like us, and you’re in northwestern Oregon, I highly recommend a Tillamook Cheese Factory Tour!
Tillamook Cheese Factory in Tillamook OR
As I have mentioned before, we try to do as much sightseeing as possible that is inexpensive or free. So if you would like to know how much this epic tour cost for the two of us, the price was $0!!!
Hard to miss the Tillamook Cheese Factory
We left Cannon Beach and began driving south on the 101. And though we were guided by our GPS, there was no way we could have driven passed the ENORMOUS blue building that houses the Tillamook Cheese Factory.
Tankers deliver the milk fresh and fast to the Tillamook Cheese Factory
The amazing Tillamook Cheese Factory opened in 1949 and was designed by iconic Seattle-based architectural firm Olson-Kundig, The Creamery is made to make you feel like you’re in a modern barn, while the big windows allow plenty of light to enter and offer wonderful views of the natural beauty surrounding the factory. It was rebuilt, bigger and better in 2018 to allow for more visitors and an even better experience.
It’s all about the dairy cows! Meet Flower, Tillamook’s Award Winning Cow
As we approached the entry we were greeted by Tillamook’s chief creamery greeter, Flower. Her image is painted on the glass above the doors. Flower is their very own award winning show cow.
A cheesy photo op that Steve couldn’t resist
Tillamook’s history began in 1909 when several small creameries joined forces to ensure all of the cheese made in the Tillamook Valley would be the same quality. Each creamery contributed $10 to start the cooperative forming the Tillamook County Creamery Association (TCCA). The association produces and sells a variety of dairy products under the Tillamook brand.
The Factory Tour Begins
Tillamook Cheese Cooking Vats
As the 48th largest dairy processor in North America, Tillamook had $! billion in sales last year. The TCCA employs almost 900 people in Oregon and is the largest employer in Tillamook County. Factory workers there cut about 1 million pounds of cheese each week. That amounts to 115 2-pound baby loafs each minute. That’s a lot of cheese!
Conveyor belt moves the blocks of cheese along
Packed cheese is readied for cold storage
Separating the curds from the whey is a key part of the process of making cheddar. Whey used to go down the drain. But the goal became a mission to eliminate waste. So if you’re wondering where the whey goes – they now have a whey processing plant that turns the leftover liquid into sweet whey powder. The whey powder is a valuable, highly nutritious ingredient in baby formula, nutrition drinks, protein bars and more. About 1,350,000 pounds of liquid whey that was once was discarded is now turned into 82,000 pounds of sweet whey powder every day.
Cold Storage Warehouse
Tillamook Cheese Factory Tour view of the Big Blue Octopus vacuum sealer
The TCCA is made up of nearly 60 dairy farms, with most of them within Tillamook County. March 2010 marked when Tillamook’s Medium Cheddar cheese won the gold medal at the 2010 World Cheese Championship Cheese Contest which was hosted by the Wisconsin Cheese Makers Association. Beating 59 other entries, Tillamook’s Medium Cheddar scored 99.6 out of 100 points. Using the same recipe for over 100 years proves that experience was on their side.
This nurturing mama (moi) is bottle feeding this sweet baby (fake) calf
Dairy cow statue looks ready to be milked at the Tillamook Cheese Factory
In 2009 the company celebrated 100 years as a farmer owned cooperative. What we found so cool is that some of those farmer/owners are the great-great-great-grandchildren of the pioneering founders.
Tillamook Cheese
We totally enjoyed our self-guided tour of the Tillamook Cheese Factory. We got to taste a variety of cheeses and loved browsing the gift shop before we returned to Ladybug. We tried not to get too carried away with our purchases because our fridge/freezer is only 10.3 cubic feet. But we had to buy a couple of baby loafs as well as a magnet to commemorate the experience.
