Farms, dairies, cooperatives and affineurs in Rheingau that you can visit or buy from.
A guide to cheese farms in Rheingau.
Handkäse dairy in Groß-Gerau, a family business since 1862, which calls itself Germany's oldest sour-milk dairy. Handkäse is sold at the dairy, which publishes no opening hours.
Cheeses: Hessischer Handkäse
Visiting: buy Handkäse directly at the dairy (its site says Handkäse is not suited to shipping)
Family dairy making Handkäse in Hüttenberg since 1959; its site calls the town Hesse's Handkäse capital. Visitors can buy at the factory shop on weekdays or from the 24-hour vending machine.
Cheeses: Hessischer Handkäse
Visiting: factory shop (Werksverkauf) on weekdays, 24-hour vending machine, refilled daily
Demeter farm with 50 dairy cows and its own raw-milk cheese dairy, in use since 1989, between the Taunus heights and the Rheingau. Its cheese is sold in Eltville and at the Wiesbaden market.
Cheeses: Zornickel (white-mould soft cheese, Camembert style), Brie-style soft cheese, Zedoner (white mould and red smear), Zornella (semi-hard cheese), Tomme Zorn
Visiting: farm shop on Tuesday and Friday afternoons, stall at the Wiesbaden Wochenmarkt on Wednesday and Saturday mornings
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Handkäse is the type: a small sour-milk cheese eaten across the Rhine-Main area, Rheinhessen and the Palatinate, and the type itself is not protected. Hessischer Handkäse is the protected name, a PGI under Regulation (EU) 784/2010 since September 2010: only Handkäse made and packed in Hesse may carry it, though the quark need not come from Hesse.
Handkäse marinated in onions, vinegar and oil. The EU single document calls it one of the best-known ways of eating the cheese.
German Wikipedia says apple wine is the usual drink, and that a dry white wine is also drunk with it in some areas such as Rheinhessen and the Palatinate. The EU single document says no inn in Hesse should be without Handkäse, alongside Äbbelwoi, the local apple wine.
The protected area is the whole of Hesse, which includes the Rheingau. German Wikipedia names four Handkäse dairies in Hesse in 2014: three in Hochelheim, part of Hüttenberg in central Hesse, and Käserei Horst in Groß-Gerau. None of those is in the Rheingau.
German Wikipedia gives the base recipe as two parts fresh cheese to three parts high-fat quark, stirred smooth and seasoned with pepper, salt and sweet paprika, with chopped or ringed onions on top or beside it. Many estates add butter, egg yolk, crème fraîche, garlic, caraway or capers.
Rheingau.de says it goes perfectly with a fruity Rheingau Riesling. German Wikipedia says it is classically drunk with white wine and served in practically all wine houses and Straußwirtschaften of Rheinhessen and the Rheingau.
Rheingau.de traces it to the Spund, the wooden bung that sealed a wine cask: the mass was first stamped out in small round shapes that recalled one.