Author Topic: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.  (Read 4508 times)

daithi23

  • Guest
Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« on: October 16, 2012, 10:29:45 PM »
Hi, I've only made a couple of cheeses but every time I go to pour the whey off from the curds, the curds want to go with the whey. If I go with this and pour them into a cheesecloth-lined colander then this quickly clogs with small parts of curd and doesn't drain. Also, the curds break up so I don't see the point of cutting them to a certain size as they all end up battered to little pieces. Am I doing something seriously wrong here?

bbracken677

  • Guest
Re: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« Reply #1 on: October 17, 2012, 12:05:34 AM »
Couple of questions: do you add calcium chloride prior to adding the rennet? Are you using homogenized, pasteurized milk? H/P milk tends to produce a curd that is a bit more delicate and needs to be handled more delicately.

I usually just dip the whey out...simply cause I can control things better and make less mess.... it is a bit difficult to manage my 16 quart "vat".

daithi23

  • Guest
Re: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« Reply #2 on: October 17, 2012, 12:17:17 AM »
I added calcium chloride to the most recent batch (not the others) and all batches turned out the same. The milk is homogenized and pasteurized so maybe that's the problem... I don't think I can easily get access to non-H/P milk, so although it's not perfect having the curds break up like that do you think it's still okay and I'll get a decent cheese with it? What's effect will it have on the finished product? Thanks.

bbracken677

  • Guest
Re: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« Reply #3 on: October 17, 2012, 01:06:53 AM »
You can still make a good cheese from h/p milk...the curd will be more delicate, so you will need to treat it that way, and the texture and flavor will not be as exceptional as it might be with raw milk.


daithi23

  • Guest
Re: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« Reply #4 on: October 17, 2012, 10:21:50 AM »
Would adding some cream to the milk help?

bbracken677

  • Guest
Re: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« Reply #5 on: October 17, 2012, 10:34:31 AM »
I have been thinking about trying a mix of no-fat milk and heavy cream to reach a 4% fat mix....I read somewhere that they dont bother to homogenize the skim milk since there is no reason to homogenize once the cream is removed.   The result might be equivalent to a pasteurized non-homogenized milk...  Just make sure you dont use ultra-pasteurized cream.

daithi23

  • Guest
Re: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« Reply #6 on: October 19, 2012, 12:05:42 AM »
I've checked around our supermarkets and and even our skimmed milk is homogenised. I'll try a little experiment next time and add some good cream to the regular milk and see how that goes...

boothrf

  • Guest
Re: Pouring the curd! Serious problem.
« Reply #7 on: October 19, 2012, 02:13:11 AM »
The best way to remove the whey without damaging the curd is to siphon the whey off using a length of small diameter tubing. I place a small hoop, say a Camembert hoop into the vat and then syphon the whey from the inside of the hoop. The hoop keeps the curd from clogging the tube. Just make sure you use a small diameter tube, if it is too large, the whey is removed from the hoop faster than it can drain into it, resulting in an empty hoop and loss of suction. Not that restarting the syphon with a tube full of whey is much of a problem, as long as you like the taste of whey!  ;)