As I told in my introduction, I bought in the beginning of last year 10 Lacaune pregnant ewes.
I started to milking in May last year ( beginning of our winter time 15 to 18 Celsius )
During that lactation season I basically made Manchego cheese using the following points:
a) All the milk were pasteurized
b) I used direct fire
c) The cultures used were 5 UC DVS fractioned in UHT milk and frozen as Ice blocks
d) During all the season I used the PH meter.
e) The criteria to define the cutting of the curd was the time of 50 minutes and every time I got a clean break.
This year is my second milking season year and after a lot of reading (mainly in this forum) I decided to make some improvements.
a) Use raw milk instead of pasteurized, because I know the quality of my milk and the health of the animals.
b) I started to use double boiler instead of direct fire.
c) I bought the same kind of cultures and rennet than used last year to be sure they are fresh.
d) I tried to use the flocculation time.
I am facing now the following problems:
1) The PH after one hour of the addition of the culture do not decrease, it keeps the same 6,6 of the beginning.
2) The flocculation time do not stay in the range of 12 to 18 minutes.
3) The clear cut point that last year were always in 50 minutes, now is something around 1h 30 min.
What am I doing wrong?
For me the big issue is that the milk is not acidifying after the addition of the culture, but why?
I am sure it is not chlorine contamination.
Can the weather have some influence? Now we are in summer 28 to 29 Celsius ?
Can other changes I did make some influence?
can someone of the experts suggest something?