(Credit: Luke Mosseau, 2022)
Cheese wheels.
(Credit: Luke Mosseau, 2022)
Lambiase and Flanagan cut the ribbon.
“Kunik!”
Nettle Meadow Farm employees shouted the name of the farm's international-award-winning cheese as farm co-founders, Sheila Flanagan and Lorraine Lambiase, cut the ribbon for the grand opening of their restaurant and store at the former Hitching Post Tavern in Lake Luzerne on Wednesday Aug. 24.
“Three-and-a-half years ago, Lorraine and I were looking for big and better locations to expand our little cheese plant in Thurman,” said Sheila Flanagan. “The first time we looked at this building, I said, 'There’s no way. There’s no amount of money in the world that could pay for heat in this place in the winter'.”
However, the large building, the only one in the area near the size they wanted, also had the necessary requirements to take on cheesemaking.
“The flagstone basement is identical to our aging room in Thurman, which ensured that our award-winning cheeses [will] be the same from year-to-year-to-year,” Flanagan said.
The historic Lake Luzerne location at 1256 Lake Ave. sat empty for five years before Flanagan and Lambiase restored it. The building was built in the late 1930s, designed to serve the local Lake Luzerne dude ranches, their website says.
The pair turned it into a creamery, farm store and "Tasting Room Tavern" for their Nettle Meadow Farm products. The tavern serves lunch and dinner Wednesday through Saturday and a Sunday brunch, their website says. They moved in earlier this year, but cut the ribbon on Wednesday.
“It’s the best cheese you’re ever going to have,” said Gina Mintzer, executive director of the Lake George Regional Chamber of Commerce and CVB, which hosted the event.
Their success comes from hard work, Mintzer said.
“I don’t live that far away and I see the lights on all night long, and the cars coming in for the shift between 2 and 6 a.m.," she said.
Flanagan and Lambiase persevered amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, infrastructure nightmares that pushed back construction, labor shortages, and inflation, to make it to the finish line.
At the ribbon-cutting ceremony, Flanagan thanked Farm Credit Bank and Glens Falls National Bank for their support over the last two decades, as well as Warren County Economic Development and the Local Development Corporation (LDC) who encouraged them from project to project. The move also would not have been possible without a grant from the Capital Region Economic Development Council, they said.
“As far as I’m concerned this a great new adventure,” said Lake Luzerne Town Supervisor Gene Merlino. “What makes me so proud is how it has grown. With help from the county, it was well worth the investment.”
According to a press release, Nettle Meadow Farm, which now has 43 employees, was founded in 1990 as a goat farm before transforming into a cheesemaking business that has won over 35 national and international prizes for their mixed-milked cheeses. The triple creme Kunik is their top product.