The Dairyman Barossa named Producer of the Year at 2025 Produce Awards - Produce Awards

Aug 29, 2025

Picture how farming used to be and you have The Dairyman Barossa.

When a box of produce from The Dairyman Barossa arrived in the delicious. test kitchen ahead of a special Produce Awards photo shoot, our Food Director Lucy Nunes was, in her own words, blown away.

“I don’t think there has ever been anything that has smelled that good coming into the delicious. kitchen before,” she says. “The smoky aroma of the bacon; the salami. Then we saw the cream, and the butter! We were so excited, we just wanted to cook with it all straight away. But we couldn’t, because we had to shoot it first.”

Of course, patience has its virtues, and Nunes and our team eventually did get to fry up that bacon, and taste that butter. But when asked how to describe it, Nunes finds that words almost fail her.

“The bacon? The fat on it – people are funny about fat on bacon, but it was just incredible,” she says. “And the butter was so creamy, and perfectly salty, and you could just tell that it had been hand-churned.”

Who is The Dairyman Barossa?

So who makes this amazing food, and how can you get a taste of it? You’ll have to head to the Barossa region, in South Australia, and find ‘The Dairyman’, AKA Michael Wohlstadt. This small-scale farmer is living proof that doing things the old-school way – with love, patience and tender guardianship of the livestock under his care – is the only way to go if you want to produce the kind of food that will make a French-trained chef weak at the knees.

Wohlstadt has been running his traditional mixed farm in the same careful and considered way for the past 45 years. For those who are used to industrialised agriculture, this will take you back to another era. Wohlstadt’s small herd of Jersey cows all have their own names, and each is cherished for its own individual personality. They’re free to roam on The Dairyman’s 32-hectare property, set on rolling green pastures in the foothills of the Barossa Ranges. This low-stress, leisurely life sees them live to more than twice the age of commercial dairy cows in Australia – 10 to 14 years compared to the average four to five.

It should be no surprise, then, to learn that the dairy products that Wohlstadt produces from the milk of these happy, healthy, well-tended cows are utterly exquisite. Hand-churned butter that could potentially make you weep a little with quiet joy. Luxuriously indulgent cream like liquid silk. Buttermilk that flows like velvet and tangs like a perfect violin solo.

The Dairyman’s beloved cows also help him raise his free-range Jersey vealers and heritage Berkshire and Tamworth pigs, which are fed milk as part of their diet. This helps to produce incredibly flavoursome, tender and rich meat products, including that irresistible bacon that made our food team swoon.

Over the years, this quietly spoken farmer who makes magic out of milk has been a finalist and Gold Medallist in the delicious. Harvey Norman Produce Awards on multiple occasions.

And this year? He’s been named as Producer of the Year.

A different way to farm

Upon accepting his award at a special ceremony at Sydney’s iconic Bennelong restaurant on August 26, Wohlstadt spoke about the importance of the Produce Awards, as it helps to promote the work of passionate and dedicated small-scale producers, who offer a more rewarding and sustainable alternative to industrial-scale farming.

“One of the things about the delicious. Harvey Norman Produce Awards is, it shows a pathway for farmers to move from commodity and getting low-value returns in difficult conditions to producing food,” he said. “Because most farmers in Australia don’t produce food. They produce commodities.

“It is really worthy that it’s recognised, and I just hope that [the delicious. Harvey Norman Produce Awards] keeps on promoting it, because it’s one way of encouraging people to pursue that as an alternative to the hard yakka of being a farmer.

“There’s a lot of satisfaction to delivering a product where people are consuming it with a knife and fork, or a chef that’s cooking it, compared to delivering it to a weighbridge and getting a weigh note… and you’re getting low-value returns.

“I just hope that a lot of farmers consider this as an alternative.”

The Dairyman also produces gourmet oyster mushrooms, and offers farm-stay accommodation in two cosy self-contained private cottages. While at the Produce Awards ceremony, Wohlstadt also revealed to delicious. that he has now just begun producing a range of Italian fresh cheeses, including burrata and fior di latte. You can catch The Dairyman Barossa at Barossa Farmers Market and Adelaide Showgrounds Farmers Markets, or find out more at thedairyman.com.au