No, stick with bulk unless you don't want to go through making bulk. Add culture, stir, wait for 5-10 mins while you prep some other things, and add rennet. You're talking about rather miniscule changes here. Drain before 6.4 and you'll be fine with the tomme.
I'd like to pick this up again, a bit. I recall a conversation somewhere, Francois and Pav, about a "lazy Frenchman," and I think it was to the subject of this thread. I know when I add MC at the rate of, say, 1%, I get an immediate ΔpH of 0.1 or higher. Somewhere else, I recall an optimal of 0.1-0.15, with 0.1 probably better, for alpine styles.
That would mean, I rennet immediately. Pav, haven't seen you much lately but if you're around, what specifically is the reasoning that is the crux of the "lazy Frenchman" debate here? My brewing days are sitting on my shoulders - one
wants a lag, because the lag means yeast aerobic respiration, budding, and all the related byproducts of respiration. That's why we don't pitch in the terminal population density, we want growth, in the fermentor, so we deliberately under-inoculate, to use the term broadly. Isn't it the same here?
To take extreme examples, if DVI can take upwards of 1 hour or (sometimes, much) more before getting the proper renneting ΔpH, and MC can result in an immediate renneting ΔpH, isn't there a benefit of coming in at a lower MC dosing, say, .5%, resulting in maybe a 1/2 hour lag?
I guess I have to think renneting immediately, and renneting with a lag of
some kind, has to make a difference in the quality of the cheese one ends up with. I'd just appreciate learning more as to why.
Even if the difference are miniscule, what are the differences, here? Pav? Francois?