Surfing Goats

Did you know that goats can surf? I didn’t, either, but these are especially cool goats. They live at the Surfing Goat Dairy, in the town of Kula, on Maui. The dairy is in upcountry (i.e., not coastal) Maui. They offer great tours with plenty of cheese tasting.

Surfing Goat makes more varieties, or I guess I should say flavors of cheese than most dairies. What avant-garde chocolate makers are doing with truffles these days, Surfing Goat is doing for goat cheese. They start with a basic creamy chevre base (called “Udderly Delicious”), and add all kinds of things I’ve never seen in cheese before. Some work really well, like the O Sole Mio, which has sun-dried tomatoes in it, and some are a little out there. I never tried the Mandalay blend, for example, which contains apple bananas and curry, but I don’t think I need to. Most of the cheese was really good, though, and the tours are fun. You can feed the goats, who are gentle and friendly, and see them milked.

All the goats (there are about 80 on the farm right now) have names, but unfortunately I didn’t write down what this one is called. She was a character.