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Post by themotherhen on May 6, 2018 1:10:02 GMT
feather, this is such an interesting thread, thank you for sharing your experiences successful and otherwise! I have only made yogurt but I would like to make cheese someday when time permits.
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Post by feather on May 6, 2018 1:20:38 GMT
feather , this is such an interesting thread, thank you for sharing your experiences successful and otherwise! I have only made yogurt but I would like to make cheese someday when time permits. Thank you, and I love hearing how others are making their milk products too. Redfish with her raw goat's milk is such an inspiration too. Like my aunt says, cheese is God smiling on us.
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Post by themotherhen on May 6, 2018 1:31:19 GMT
feather, "cheese is God smiling on us", I love that (and cheese) so much! @redfish, has great information too!
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Post by feather on May 7, 2018 16:05:00 GMT
Here are the camemberts before they get a coat of white mold on them. They are a little over 4 inches across. Two gallon batch, so each is about 8 oz.
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Post by feather on May 12, 2018 0:21:31 GMT
I'm not seeing white mold on the camemberts (baby bries). I dried and resalted them this morning to see if I could spur them on. EDIT: 5/16 saw some dots of white mold, finally! Flipped them today. Hoping to see more tomorrow, whoo hoo. Edit: 5/23 the camemberts are half covered in white mold, woo hoo! Next time I turn them, tomorrow, I'll take pictures. I'm so happy. Started some cream cheese and I do think I'll try canning them in pint jars. Sanitize the electric roaster. 4 gallons whole pasteurized and homogenized cow's milk, brought to 87 degrees F. Add: 1 tsp. calcium chloride 1 pkt or 1/4 tsp mesophilic dry culture 16 drops of single rennet in 1/4 cup distilled water, use 3 tsps of that solution, or 6 drops of triple rennet in 1/4 cup distilled water, use 3 tsps of that, discard the rest. Let acidify and coagulate for 12 to 24 hours obviously it will cool to room temperature during that time. I'm going with 24 hours, more tangy. Then tomorrow night, scoop curd with a ladle and drain in butter muslin (or thin tea towels or double cheese cloth) hanging for 12 hours until the next morning. Ideally this should reduce to 16 oz to 24 oz per gallon. So 2 to 3 - 8 oz mason jars per gallon, or 8 to 12 jars for the 4 gallon batch. Sterilize the jars and heat cheese in jars placed in a pan partially filled with water in the oven until melted. Wipe the top edges of the jars with vinegar to assure a fat free seal. Top off with sanitized flats and screw tops. Put in a boiling water bath, once to boiling, 30 minutes. Cool on towel lined counter. That I should finish if it all works out, Sunday. 5/13 EDIT: I overheated it so pressed it. It is still wet so I'll press it overnight and use it for ricotta when I make lasagna. I'll try cream cheese again another day. I need a cheese therapist for all my mistakes. 5/15 EDIT: I brined the pressed cream cheese for 24 hours. We cut it and tasted it, it does taste just like a good cream cheese. It's not spreadable but I can cut it, so we'll use it like ricotta in lasagna. DH and I both liked the taste, very nice.
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Post by feather on May 15, 2018 19:09:45 GMT
5/15 I'm making a double batch of cheddar curds for DH and DS, as they are both traveling to different places on friday. It's good to munch on the drive and share when they get there.
4 gallons in an 18 qt roaster, one roaster has orange colored cheddar curds, the other white. The batches should make a little over 8 lbs of curds. I'm glad we found the second electric roaster, it takes the same amount of time to make 8 lbs as it does to make 4 or 2 lbs. Plus there is no cooking in the kitchen today, no room until tomorrow when they are salted and bagged up, roasters are cleaned, then back to the usual cooking.
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Post by feather on May 16, 2018 22:24:31 GMT
Finished products.... for cheese curds, 9 lbs, yum. I was able to cook some oyster mushrooms, onions, garlic, spinach swiss cheese, cheese curds, crackers crumbs on top, to test out and see how we like it. Oyster mushrooms are chewy, we liked it. Who knew that could be good?
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Post by feather on May 19, 2018 16:27:30 GMT
shellymay, I watched a video of Rick Stein's on eating/making food in Corsica. Of interest were two segments on sheep and sheep's milk and cheese from sheep milk.
The first segment begins around minute 23, and it shows the milking process with milking equipment and how very hard won it is to have sheep milk. There is not a lot of milk per ewe so it seems quite difficult. Then he makes cheese.
The second segment begins around minute 43 at another farm, where they are shearing by hand with mechanical clippers, then showing them making a kind of brevi cheese followed by some fresh ricotta. The brevi bacteria is the red/orange mold (so kind of smelly) and it makes for a smooth melting cheese after 2 months, not unlike the recent raclette I made.
I thought it was very informative specifically related to sheep's milk and cheese. If you get time to see it, I hope you like it.
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Post by shellymay on May 23, 2018 18:34:26 GMT
Thanks for the info, but I am not watching a film that allows mold to grow on the food I eat, tellin ya I ain't doing it Its all fun and games until someone gets mold in their eye
Okay so my sheep are MEAT sheep but wow some of them have cow udders and I swear you can get a gallon if you milked it out
PS, your DH is still on my shit list!!!!!!!! LOL
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Post by feather on May 24, 2018 17:25:12 GMT
shellymay , I always read your posts on this thread to my DH, and he laughs, and he likes being high on anyone's list. He says you can bribe him by offering him permission to metal detect your land and he will bribe you back by bringing you cheese.
As much as posting pictures really is a pain in the backside, I got to a few of them. Here is the 9 lbs of cheddar curds, half white, half orange. Since it takes all afternoon to make cheese, 2 roasters instead of one are almost the same amount of work as just making one. Each bag had 1.5 lbs and there were 6 bags. DH took some to his son's family and ate some on his fishing trip, DS took them to the funeral up north. We've got a little over a bag left in the fridge.
Okay then then this gem, the raclette was supposed to take 8 weeks or so, but at 5 weeks it was getting skin slippage where the rind is, there is some brevi bacteria working under the rind, it was like cream for 1/4th inch, very soft, so I packaged it. I've melted it, it is mild and lovely and melts quite nicely.
This is my second batch of brie/camembert--camemberts are smaller but they could be called baby bries since it is the same recipe. They are small, 4+ inches across. The first batch bombed, did not cover themselves in white mold, they covered themselves in red and blue mold, so I threw them out. This second batch I inoculated with store bought camembert white mold in distilled water, instead of buying expensive culture for that part. I'm happy as a clam to show you that the second batch is in fact covering itself in white mold, it's almost done with this phase. Once they are covered in white mold, they get patted down, wrapped in crumpled parchment or foil, then put in the regular fridge for weeks to start to soften. The white mold works on the cheese during this time, to make the outer parts more soft and liquidy, almost like it was melted, while the inner parts stay in a paste consistency. I'm showing everyone this so that Shellymay is completely grossed out.
Happy cheese making or eating to you all.
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Post by feather on May 27, 2018 1:41:50 GMT
I made some provolone yesterday, the curds sat in the sink until tonight. Then I boiled water and stretched them into balls and they are now soaking in brine. I love getting the hang of the provolone/mozzarella. I know I should get a ph meter I can calibrate but just waiting one day makes them just right, so I'm not pursuing the ph meter or strips. It seems to work for me to just let them sit a day to acidify and then stretch them the next day.
I'm thankful no one else washes dishes or they could screw up the provolone with dirty dish water.
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Post by feather on May 27, 2018 16:37:48 GMT
I'm making mother cultures today to last for the next year. I put one dose of thermo or meso, in each quart of skim milk, then let it culture for 12 hours or how ever many hours it takes until the milk is coagulated, shiny. The thermo needs to be around 100 degrees for 12 hours, so a sink of hot water does that. The meso needs to be in the 90's and the room temperature will do that on these frickin' hot days. See the blessing in the hot days? It's 11 am and I'm sweating already doing absolutely nothing.
Then once done, they are put in 8 oz freezer containers and labeled (all need to be sanatized), then when I need culture I use them as though I have direct vat inoculation powders (dvi), I use one 8 oz package of mother culture for each 1/4th tsp of dvi. We do like the cheeses I make but sometimes the mother cultures aren't really 'strong', and some cheese makers don't do that just for that reason. Since we like the cheese, we are satisfied with mostly mother cultures and those dvi cultures are expensive. If I was making cheese to sell, then I might not make the mother cultures because the strength of the culture is not as dependable as the dvi strength.
Why did I move into a house 30 years ago? I should have probably bought a kitchen type chemistry lab with attached bedrooms and bathrooms.
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Post by feather on May 31, 2018 11:53:10 GMT
Cheese kit give-away!
The Gavin Webber I write about, he is giving away a free hard cheese kit, to anywhere in the world. ( Skandi, anywhere in the world!) So anyone interested please enter it for free with your email address. He is doing it to celebrate his 100 thousandth subscriber to his videos and blogs and podcasts.
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Post by feather on May 31, 2018 13:37:58 GMT
Thanks for the info, but I am not watching a film that allows mold to grow on the food I eat, tellin ya I ain't doing it Its all fun and games until someone gets mold in their eye It's all fun and games until someone gets mold in their eye.
I'm still laughing.
Be careful, you'll shoot your eye out kid. I'm pretty sure I saw you in a movie about a red ryder, you were the mother.
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Post by feather on Jun 4, 2018 22:10:55 GMT
My little camemberts were ready to be wrapped in parchment and put in the regular refrigerator! Oh was that experience fun! Really was fun after the first batch didn't work, to get one to work. I like succeeding when challenging myself to do a little better.
So now they can be eaten, or ripened, softening them under the white mold until almost runny at the edges while remaining a paste in the middle.They were started on 5/4 and they can rest or be eaten or ripen for a week or so. 6 weeks give or take from making them to eating them.
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Post by shellymay on Jun 6, 2018 16:35:43 GMT
I have been missing for a while, just caught up on this thread..... You just tell your DH to come on down to KY and metal detect the land until he drops, I am afraid to say I will have the last laugh in the end, see Wisconsin is kinda flat, wait first I need to say HAND OVER THE CHEESE UPON ARRIVAL, you know pay up front back to what I was saying, KY is rolling hills and if you aren't used to them his walking with the detector here is muscle pulling and he might not last long, but no matter I will have my cheese in (hand/mouth), hehe..... At present we have 203 acres and most of it open, could/should be years of treasures
Those curds look so yummy, you just had to post pictures to make me have these sudden cravings and the rubbing in of the list of folks who receive some and my name was clearly not there , again you talk of the mold and explain it off like it is the best thing since sliced bread, think I would rather eat a earth worm really your talent and enjoyment you get out of making these cheeses makes me jealous!
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Post by feather on Jun 6, 2018 17:49:35 GMT
shellymay, DH was happy and he laughed. He is thinking on it for sure, maybe in winter when we can't dig here. 200 acres! I will PM you about location and payment cheese types. Does Kentucky get snow in winter or is it diggable, thawed, in winter? The mold, I hear you. There are good molds and bad molds depending on safety and taste. Red/orange does have a pretty stinky smell but taste is good. Blue tastes like blue cheese, which I like. White is more mushroomy, pleasant and mild. Some pink mold isn't good, some black mold isn't good--safety wise, so I've not tasted them. No one MUST eat the rinds of cheese, but it is often a pleasant surprise. Always use caution if your eyes or smeller tells you not to eat something--better safe than sorry.
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Post by feather on Jun 7, 2018 0:08:36 GMT
I wanted DH to try the brie, my brie/camembert, to see how it compared with how he liked the bought on sale brie/camembert.
It's at the point, a beautiful point, where just under the rind, it is starting to get very liquidy and creamy but the middle is still pasty but soft. It's just a lovely cheese. If you've never tried camembert or brie, buy a little, live a little.
So he eats it on a cracker, then we have another discussion about frogs!! don't ask, then he says about the cheese, "do you want the truth?".
GULP, 'yes'.
He says, 'it is better than the store bought', 'it still has some aftertaste I'm not fond of but it is good overall'. I'm so glad he liked it. He's a country boy with experience (before me) in 3 cheeses, colby, velvetta, and cheese curds. I'd say this is all good.
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Post by feather on Jun 20, 2018 15:16:02 GMT
I haven't made cheese in almost a month.
I found this recipe for 'rat trap#5' aka 'hoop cheese' which is a very orange cheese that behaves like colby, on the cheesemaking forum where I read/learn. It's cheeseforum.org
There are many odd things about the recipe but still the pictures of the cheese are something I'd like to make for a table cheese that only needs to age for a couple weeks. DH is a big fan of colby, so maybe this will work.
Odd thing: well it is a goat cheese but I'm going to use cow's pasteurized and homogenized because I don't have a choice of milks.
Odd thing 2: It uses flora danica, a type of meso, but not a regular meso. I like flora danica because it gives cheeses buttery tones.
Odd thing 3: This is the weirdest part of the instructions/recipe. After adding the rennet, it sits for 4 HOURS. Usually after adding rennet then the milk is left to make curds for 45 minutes to an hour, then cutting. In this recipe the curds are cut after 4 hours.
EDIT: The gelled cheese curds cut just fine, but even with the most gentle stirring about 1/3 of the curds shattered. It is not uncommon for some of the curds to shatter, but, there was nothing I could do to lessen it. I stirred it gently, lifting, barely moving them, and the shattering only happened in the very beginning. From there on out, in stirring for 75 minutes while warming to 110 degrees F, at 5-10 minute intervals, the curds shrank as normal.
Odd thing 4: The whole recipe/instructions take over 9 hours before brining. That means we started boiling water in the roaster at 7 am, so that the milk was warm by 9:30, and if I stay on schedule I'll be busy with it until 7 or so tonight. That is a long day.
EDIT: In the pressing stage (before brining), usually this goes on overnight in most of my cheeses. This cheese was pressed at 5 lbs for 20 minutes, then 10 lbs for 30 minutes, then 15 lbs for 1 hour (added another 1/2 hour to it), and 15 lbs for 2 hours (added another 1/2 hour). This is a very short amount of pressing. Each time I flipped and rewrapped the cheese to put it back in the press, the middle felt like it was full of jello, so not terribly firm. I figured I'd just follow the recipe for the most part, and get it in the brine last night.
EDIT:brining it, I took it out this morning. I am imagining the round will bulge a little on the sides today while it is air drying since the middle seems so jello-y. The salt will work its way in while the moisture will work its way out. Then I will vac pack for 2 weeks.
Has anyone made cheese with a long window of time after adding the rennet? How did it effect the cheese?
I should have some idea about the 4th of July, I guess.
This is rat trap #5
EDIT: Happy Independence day! We cut and tasted it today. It's only two weeks old. It has a very solid structure we weren't expecting but when I cut it in slices it crumbles slightly, not a lot. If left to age longer I bet the crumbling would stop. We tasted it, and it is a mild colby like cheese, very nice and it has a creamy texture in the mouth. DH and I were very impressed. Then the real test, put a slice in a bowl and microwave it for 30 seconds. It turned into a SHINY mass of melted cheese that would string out like mozzarella, very melty with good taste. That's going to be the perfect grilled cheese type of cheese for us. I'll definitely be making this one again, a very big success with very different rules for the recipe.
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Post by feather on Jun 22, 2018 17:35:55 GMT
Our parmesans, some with mild lipase, some with sharp lipase, and then parmesan #6 which had no lipase....we popped it open today. It was nice and parmesan smelling but not really salty or sharp enough at 13 months. I'll probably always use lipase in the future. It had 24 hours in the brine, so I might have to lengthen the brining time to get it a little more salty.
Of the parmesans we made (16 so far), there were only 3 left that were made in 2017, so they weren't ready until this year. We've eaten 4 in the past 18 months, leaving only 12 to age, most of them will need to age until the middle of 2019 to be 12-24 months old. It doesn't hurt to have so many aging, the only upkeep is to keep the cheese cave refrigerator running at the right temperature.
We use parmesan on our popcorn and on spaghetti and we eat a lot of those things.
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Post by feather on Jun 26, 2018 22:01:03 GMT
I haven't been confident in cheese making when it comes to cheddars and colbys. I started making cheeses with dvi (direct vat inoculation) powders purchased from home cheese making outlets. Some of the early ones were very acidic, strong flavored and I could have probably reduced the amount of culture. That's a problem with long aged cheeses, it takes a long time to recognize good or bad results.
Then I started to make 'mother cultures', which is a dvi put in a sterilized skim milk, cultured, then froze in 8 oz portions. I didn't know how well that would culture the cheese and it was going to take a year or so, to see the results.
So I had cheddars from may '17 which were turning a year+ aged and we opened one today, Cheddar5.
It is incredibly good, not over cultured, not too strong, not bitter, not crumbly, it holds its shape beautifully in a slice and has a beautiful cheddar flavor, so I guess the mother cultures work quite well and I can be a little more confident about it.
I asked DH to see and taste, he almost ran running from the room, 'no don't make me do this, all your cheddars and colbys are too strong!' I wrestled with him and then pinned him down and tied him up with duct tape, then showed him the beautiful slices and force fed him a piece. He said, 'wow, this is good, this is the best you've made so far', so I un-duct taped him and let him go on about his business.
Here's a picture of it, with a slice.
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Post by feather on Jul 4, 2018 15:30:58 GMT
This is a minute and a half video on someone that makes vodka from whey. www.youtube.com/watch?v=uL2PTyE18_wFrom what I've learned, it takes 5 gallons of whey to make 1 liter of vodka. Who knew? We aren't planning on doing it but it was still interesting. I'm planning on cutting open the rat trap#5 today or tomorrow and I'll add that picture and taste test results to the post about making it, back a couple weeks ago.
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Post by feather on Jul 30, 2018 19:05:28 GMT
In between canning days, I have some provolone and cottage cheese going today. Started the provolone with 6 cups of heavy whipping cream (had an additive I didn't want and it was homogenized which I didn't want, but I'm not going to waste it) and 3.5 gallons of skim milk.
Provolone: A mother thermo culture, mild lipase, CaCl2, and triple rennet. The texture of the curds is really different. There is no shattering at all. The whey is milky looking compared to the whey with whole milk. The curds are beautiful and smooth, and they are a little sticky, slightly matting. I can't wait to see how this turns out.
ADDITION: Well, here's what happened. First of all the curds are nothing like the whole milk curds, so it is a big difference. No shattering at all. They are rounded and almost rubbery. One of the tell-tale signs that the ph has dropped to 5.2 (stretching ph) is that they are squeeky. Squeeky when you put them in your mouth and chew. So after cutting, resting, raising the temperature, stirring, and resting in whey for 3 hours (yes 3 hours), is they were READY TO STRETCH. Unbelievable.
Then DH comes in the kitchen and I said, just look at the curds, how different they are. They are rounded and rubber like. He says, they look just like the curds from when I worked at the cheese factory when I was young! I don't have a ph meter that works so I did a stretch test.
The stretch test is heating whey to 180 then adding a little bit of the curds and then seeing if they begin to melt and stick together. They did. So I heated all the whey and started stretching larger portions into 3 feet stretches, it was magic. I didn't stretch it a lot because I wanted to keep as much milk fat as possible. I made it into shiny smooth balls and stuck it in some brine to get some salt.
This skim milk + cream I've been reading about, is a well kept secret!!!!! It was magical, I couldn't hardly believe how well it worked. I'm a happy camper and one of us has to get up at 5 am to take the provolone out of the brine.
Cottage cheese: 1/2 gallon skim milk, 1/2 gallon whole milk, meso mother culture, 3 drops of triple rennet and it sits for 4-8 hours until it is cut and heated.
ADDITION: This is just a really good cheese day! So I cut it and heated it over 40 minutes to 110 degrees F, then let it stay there for 20 more minutes. It was great, it had firm very large curds for cottage cheese. I strained it through cheese cloth then gave it a cold soak in cold water twice. Then put it in a container with a little cream and salt, and labeled it and put it in the fridge to eat. Two good cheeses in one day. I can't believe it. It is a miracle, well, cheese is a miracle anyways.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 30, 2018 22:54:03 GMT
I have finally ventured from basic panir and chevre to mozzarella. Took 6 gallons until I got it right.
And I am NOT pleased with Rikki Carroll's recipe.
Finally found a recipe on YouTube that is quite workable, and only requires citric acid and rennet.
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Post by feather on Jul 31, 2018 0:11:24 GMT
I have finally ventured from basic panir and chevre to mozzarella. Took 6 gallons until I got it right. And I am NOT pleased with Rikki Carroll's recipe. Finally found a recipe on YouTube that is quite workable, and only requires citric acid and rennet. Very cool @pony, your mozzerella recipe is the quick mozzarella (versus the traditional type). If you get the right amount of citric acid, it stretches! It brings the ph to 5.2 which is the magic number. I hope you enjoyed it.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 31, 2018 12:49:27 GMT
I have finally ventured from basic panir and chevre to mozzarella. Took 6 gallons until I got it right. And I am NOT pleased with Rikki Carroll's recipe. Finally found a recipe on YouTube that is quite workable, and only requires citric acid and rennet. Very cool @pony , your mozzerella recipe is the quick mozzarella (versus the traditional type). If you get the right amount of citric acid, it stretches! It brings the ph to 5.2 which is the magic number. I hope you enjoyed it. Lovin' it.
I make a summertime salad with tomato, red onion, basil, balsamic vinaigrette, and fresh mozzarella. I think DH is getting a bit tired of it, but I could eat this 6 days a week and twice on a Sunday.
Really want to try hard cheese again, but will wait until we have time to make a press.
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Post by feather on Aug 8, 2018 17:21:02 GMT
Using a press or not.
Pony, I just wanted to mention, that there are some cheeses that don't require much of a press and you can 'make do' with other contraptions.
Like for cheese curds, they don't require a press, I just put the curds in cheese cloth, twist it tight, then put a bread board on bottom and top, and a gallon of water on top (8 lbs), to press for a few minutes.
And some softer cheeses like havarti and buttercase you can rig some weight over the follower to the mold, like water filled half gallon containers (4 lbs), or bricks or lifting weights.
There's camembert and brie that dries and gets into shape by it's own weight and flipping them many times, no additional weights needed. Some recipes for blue cheeses let the curds barely knit together with crevices and air holes for the purpose of growing the blue mold.
The one's that require a press are cheddars, swisses, colby, parmesan, romano, and caerfilly.
There are different kinds of presses.
This is the kind DH made: it uses a spring for up to 50 lbs of pressure.
EDIT:@pony, or anyone. DH and I were talking last night and he said for $25 + cost of materials +shipping, he'd put a press like the above press (without mold and follower) together if anyone wants one. He would do the drilling and assembly and it would be just like mine. The base would be a breadboard, if possible made of bamboo, the wood parts pine, and he'd cut the small squares out of a plastic type of breadboard. I would recommend it for batches that are 1 gallon to 6 gallon (no larger). The mold could be as large as 6-7 inches in diameter.
This is considered a dutch press I think: the farther out you hang weight, the more pressure it gives you. It doesn't need to be as complicated as this one, or as pretty.
And this one is often made at home, and many people like it made with 4 poles instead of 2 for stability reasons.
When I press, I then open the press, unwrap, rewrap, flip the cheese, and this is repeated 4-6 times. The first two presses allow the cheese in the mold to come out fairly easily but to me the 3rd one looks a little cumbersome but I have no experience with it.
Probably more than you wanted to know.
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Post by feather on Aug 8, 2018 17:41:37 GMT
Reporting failures is no fun, but, to be fair, if I don't report them then I'm not helping myself or anyone. Failed Gruyere that was made 3/2017. It was fine early on. The problem was me not recognizing and bothering to check under the wax and I know I should have. I went to unwax it last night and it had a terrible brown mold on the edges where air seeped in, then it grew and grew, and when I cut it open through the middle, there were crevices with blue mold. It didn't smell very good at all. I tossed it. Sorry I failed you Gruyere.
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Post by feather on Aug 8, 2018 20:48:46 GMT
Today since it is only going to be 80 degrees F outside/inside, we are making colby, DH's favorite.
Two challenges:
1. The temperature of the water used to wash the curd needs to be at 60 degrees F while the room temperature is 80 degrees F. The water, well water, or spring water, needs to be boiled, so it has to be boiled and then brought down to 60 degrees or less. For this, I boiled the water and now I'm cooling it in gallon containers in a sink of cold water. It's holding at about 60 and I'm not able to get it any lower. This took too many hours. Next time I'll boil the water the night before and store it in the cheese cave or the refrigerator.
2. The regular whole milk is pasteurized and homogenized but I found with the provolone that when I added the skim P&H 3.5 gallons to the cream P&H 6 cups, it made a better curd. So this time I'm using 1% P&H 3.5 gallons along with cream P&H 4 cups and hoping for a similar result, meaning, the curds don't shatter and they become rounded shrunken and more 'rubber like'. (more like raw milk or at least more like non-homogenized milk)
(we are killing wasps outside and finding all the wasp houses and knocking them down, so we don't have a wasp invasion in the fall in the house like we did last year) ----------------------------------
The 1% and cream seemed to make a perfect curd when making the colby, no shattering, all rounded and smooth curds.
The colby looks near perfect so far. It's spending 12 hours in brine today. I boiled up 3 gallons of well water and cooled it and put it in gallons and then into the cheese cave freezer section to stay cool until the next batch of colby.
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Post by feather on Aug 16, 2018 14:51:49 GMT
Yesterday I made 2, almost 4 gallon batches of cheese. Colby4 and Cheddar Cheese Curds. It was a long day.
I used skim milk cow's P&H with heavy whipping cream. The curd that formed was smooth, rounded, glossy and it made nice cheese.
I contacted the company that processes the milk and cream we buy and asked their lab tech, or process engineer or lab engineer some questions about the pasteurization and homogenization.
When milk comes in, the cream is removed, making skim milk. For 1%, or 2%, or whole milk, the cream is added back in, in the correct proportion, then it is homogenized being pressed through a fine mesh. This isn't done to the cream. The homogenization process sends out fat globs that are smaller coated in casein, which is what causes problems with poor texture in cheese--grainy cheese. So by using the skim and cream, it is like using non-homogenized milk--smoother bendable cheese. Skim + cream costs a dollar or two more than just whole milk, not too much.
Wasn't that nice? She was very helpful!
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