This Missouri cheese farm is an hour’s drive from KC, and worth every mile
Advance Funds Network, a small business finance service based in Brooklyn, New York, posted the results of a survey in which participants were asked about the most popular businesses in each state that they are willing to drive over an hour to visit.
If you’re looking for a summer getaway in the state of Missouri while the kids are out of school, this top-rated destination is less than an hour away from Kansas City.
The survey, consisting of an online survey of 3,014 people, said the Green Dirt Farm Creamery in Weston, 40 minutes north of Kansas City, was their top small business destination to visit in Missouri. The farm also runs Green Dirt on Oak, the farm-to-table restaurant on : 1601 Oak St. with a menu built around the cheese they make from sheep’s milk and the meat raised on their farm in Weston.
The farm specializes in sheep milk cheeses, and the products they offer are made from the sheep raised on the Weston farm. Visitors can buy food items at the store in Weston or online. A cafe is open to visitors who can try one of the cheeses paired with various menu items, such as “The Stoney One,” a sandwich featuring turkey breast and the farm’s garlic peppercorn cheese.
Tours and tastings at the farm are priced at $20 per person, according to the website. Prices for other events are also listed there.
Green Dirt Farm founder Sarah Hoffmann grew up on a farm and had dreamed of running her own farm business, according to a biography on the farm’s website. She took inspiration from a family member who owned a gourmet cheese shop and started her farm in 2002.
Visitors can book a tour to get a look at the farm, their milking parlor, the cheese kitchen and get a taste of their cheeses in the farm’s shop.
The online survey used a two-step process to guarantee each participant and their responses were authentic, using tools like digital fingerprinting, bot checks, geo-verification, speeding detection and response reviews by team members.
Green Dirty Creamery and Farm is well known in the cheese-making world. In 2021, Food & Wine featured the farm in its “The Best Cheese in America” list. In 2023, the American Cheese Society named its Prairie Tomme cheese the third best in show, out of 1,400 entries.
“We’re really making a name for ourselves as one of the best sheep’s milk cheese makers in the United States,” Hoffmann said in 2023. “I don’t think it’s a stretch at all to say that.”
