This sweet taste of success is thanks to the flourishing demand for the mouthwatering ice creams and sorbets which come from Chalder Farm at Sidlesham.

And it's the result of a dream Caroline has nurtured since before she and her husband Chris married in 2000.

At the beginning of the following year they devoted a great deal of time to researching the process of ice cream making, flavours and packaging, but a happy event meant it all had to be put on hold.

"Just before we were married we started thinking what we could do with all the milk Chris' dairy herd produced, some kind of alternative product," explains Caroline.

"Ice cream seemed the ideal solution but the patter of tiny feet came along, and our oldest son Joseph was born in October 2001. Then our second son, Samuel, arrived in November 2003, and when you have babies, it isn't the right time to start a new business.

"But during that time I still wanted to make ice cream – I had a very deep gut feeling it was the right thing for me. It had taken me a long time to find what I really wanted to do with my life, and that was it."

In late 2007, when Samuel was four, Caroline suggested to Chris they should look at the buildings on the farm and get ready to launch the business.

They redeveloped the old dairy, ensuring it now met stringent food hygiene standards, and the machinery required was installed by May 2008. Caroline lost no time in putting it to good use and the first Caroline's Dairy ice cream was produced in July.

"It was a very quick learning process," Caroline says. "We bought the machinery from a company in Hereford and went to a demonstration day there, but I didn't actually make any ice cream myself until I had my own machinery.

"An Italian man came to help me formulate recipes. He asked what kind of ice cream I wanted to make and I said I wanted to make as natural a product as I could, with natural flavourings and colourings rather than synthetic.

"He spent a day with me and during that time, incredibly, we managed to make enough to fill a whole freezer, a broad spectrum of different flavours.

"I sent my mother off on a food hygiene course and she came in to help, mainly doing up pots for me – we had a real laugh together in the dairy."

Caroline got off to a flying start, with three customers – Runcton Farm Shop, Compton Farm Shop and Bunn Leisure – already signed up even before she had started production. The ice creams and sorbets rapidly became a big hit and as word spread, Caroline found more and more outlets asking to stock them.

Just ten weeks after launching the business, Caroline was out and about spreading the word, taking her special ice cream bike to the Goodwood Revival where she found hundreds of willing customers.

The distinctive bike has become a regular sight at the Revival and other events and fetes, and has been joined by a second model.

Caroline created a special ice cream – stem ginger and honeycomb – for Rolls Royce hospitality and that has delighted visitors to the factory, while other flavours are now proving popular in the company's staff kiosk.

The ice creams and sorbets made in her dairy at Sidlesham are now on sale in shops and restaurants across an area stretching from Emsworth to Littlehampton and north as far as Petworth, delivered in Caroline's eye-catching little white freezer van.

"In the winter we went on an ice cream cake making demonstration and I made and sold some which were a success, so I may look at adding these to the range after the summer season," Caroline says.

She is also looking at the possibility of doing more weddings and in spring the Charlie Harper's restaurant in Chichester will start to stock the products – people have been asking for a long time if they were available in the city.

But Caroline is adamant she does not want her business to grow too big – she prefers to 'stay local' in every respect.

"I have met some lovely people since I started doing this and I've had so much support and encouragement from all my customers and people I talk to at events," she says.

"They all tell me they love the ice cream and also like the idea
it is so local – that we are using milk from our own dairy herd and using local fruit, making it as natural as I can.

"I am going to have to get someone to help me with the deliveries as well as another ice cream maker, and my mother has taken over a lot of the accounts side for me," she says.

"This is very much a family business – my husband Chris and the two boys all help and have lots of fun at the events we take the bikes to. Chris provides me with the fantastic milk from our herd, I make the ice cream and the boys help to eat it. We all have great fun when trying out new flavours, sitting around the kitchen table with spoons.

"Ice cream is a happy product – it makes people smile and it's lovely when you can see people really enjoying what you've made.

"The farm is a very big part of what we're doing. Joseph and Samuel love helping to feed the calves and with bedding-up and mucking out. We call this 'The Funny Farm' because there are always little incidents we call 'disasters', like machinery breaking down or the cattle getting out, but we always see the funny side of them.

"It is hard work on the farm but we have a great time together and even when the 'disasters' come along, we end up laughing.

"We're a very strong family unit – I try to support Chris with the farm and he supports me with the ice cream.

"We know how lucky we are and we appreciate it. We also like sharing things – during the holidays we try to invite both the boys' year groups to come along and enjoy walks with us around the farm – not all children get the chance to do that kind of thing.

Visit www.carolinesdairy.co.uk


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