hi all,
i had a go at making a blue vein cheese (following recipe from Ricki Carroll's book)... all seemed to go according to plan but the result is a little bizarre....
my cheese - see pics - is about a month old now. in ricki's book, and another i have (by Carole Willman) the authors suggest that after 30 days ripening at 12oC the surface should be covered with blue green mould (and maybe a reddish brown smear - like i've seen in some of the stilton pics on this forum). and after 30 days you 'scrape off the excess mould', wrap in foil and ripen for another 2 months at either 8oC or 12oC (two recipes say different temps). so my blue mould grew just fine, the cheese has been at 12oC for a month, but in a big thick velvety coat rather than like the smear in all the pictures i've seen here. you'll see what i mean...now there is even whitish mould appearing, especially where i poked holes in it.
i didn't read this forum until today, so i didn't know what it should look like. i just let it grow, and scraped it off today (see pic). it looks pretty ordinary, but you can see the blue mould has penetrated the holes. it actually tastes ok - just sort of cheesy, not like mould ripened cheese. (that was a few hrs ago, and i still feel ok...!). anyway, i've wrapped it up and will see what happens. but if anyone has any comments i'd be very pleased to hear. have i added too much mould? left it grow too long??
cheers and thanks!
Kate.