Making

Cheese Making Homepage

Cheese Making Steps

Basic Principles
Milk:
◦ Types
◦ Processing
◦ Yield
◦ Products
Acidification
Starter Cultures:
◦ Function
◦ Manufacturers
◦ Manufactured Products
Lipases
Colourants:
◦ General
◦ Annatto
Acids
Coagulation
Calcium Chloride
Rennets:
◦ Animal
◦ Plant
◦ Microbial
◦ Fermentation
Milk Additives
Curd:
◦ When to Cut
◦ How to Cut
Salt:
◦ Function
◦ Types
◦ Salting Curds
◦ Salting Rinds
Pressing Curds
Brine:
◦ Making
◦ Using
◦ Maintaining
◦ For Preserving
Turning Cheeses
Ripening
Rinds:
◦ General
◦ Natural
◦ Ash

Defects

General:
◦ Coagulation
◦ Surface
◦ Body
◦ Aroma
◦ Flavour
Specific:
◦ Blue Mould
◦ White Mould

Equipment

Books
Cheese Caves
Cheesecloths
Hygrometers
Mats
Miscellaneous
pH Meters
Scales
Vats (Stockpots)
Thermometers

Cheese Making Equipment, Thermometers

Most cheese making uses heat in the 27-38 C/80-100 F range and thus most kitchen cooking thermometers do not measure cool enough with any accuracy. Examples:

• The first picture is of a standard kitchen meat cooking thermometer, while nice and hardy, it does not read accurately enough at cooler temperatures, is slow to stabilize, and if used on meat, hard to get clean enough for cheese making.
• The second picture is of a standard kitchen candy & frying thermometer, it also does not read accurately enough at cooler temperatures, is slow to stabilize, fragile and needs to be withdrawn from the milk to read the hard to read gauge.
• The last picture is of a standard kitchen digital thermometer, it can read low and accurately, can memorize/hold the last reading, easily switch between C and F, has a long probe for reading middle of the milk temperature, stabilizes on it's temperature reading in a few seconds and is easy to read. The only negative is having to change the battery, but that is normally only every few years.

For the reasons above, digital cooking thermometers are recommended, ensure you get one with auto-power off in case you forget to switch it off.

More information and discussion on cheese making thermometers is available normally in the forum's Equipment - Cheese Making Board or by searching the forum.