Gouda - better at 4#

[scasnerkay]

I made another 4 gallon cheese this week with my new set up (Avanto warmer). At $27 for 4 gallons pasteurized non-homogenized milk, this could become an expensive way to spend my new found retirement!  On the other hand it keeps me at home for a day....
I decided on gouda this time, since the scalding portion relies on warm water rather than me using the not very sensitive thermostat on the Avantco unit. Overall the experience was better than my caerphilly last week. I cleaned all the equipment the night ahead as suggested by "Spoons", and I did not make as much of a mess with the siphoning. I had 6.5 hours from milk coming to temperature, to cheese coming out of the press. And it was on targets with pH and with the sense of "grip" in the curd. So I have hope with this one! It is in the brine now.
I tried entering my data in an excel sheet as shown. Not sure if I will stick with this format of record keeping.

[jwalker]

I made another 4 gallon cheese this week with my new set up (Avanto warmer). At $27 for 4 gallons pasteurized non-homogenized milk, this could become an expensive way to spend my new found retirement!

Retired eh ? Congratulations , I just kind of Semi-retired myself.

Sounds like the new system is working good.

As for price , I was finding it a little expensive as well , on my last make I decided to use a mixture of milks , I bough two gallons of raw milk @ 6.99 , and 2 gallons regular homo milk @ $2.50 , the mixture resulted in a great curd , the same as if I had used all raw , but the price was about $7 less.

You might want to give it a try , it worked great for me.

[Spoons]

You only pressed 3.25 hours until you reached your PH goal. I'm getting that too since I made the jump to 4 gallon makes (using same cultures). Funny how it acidifies much faster than a 2 gallon make. The 2 gallon make even had more cultures per volume.

[scasnerkay]

Spoons: I even cut back a bit on the starter as you recommended, with 3/8 tsp total rather than 1/2 tsp. Maybe I need to invest in one of the mini-scales and weigh it instead!
And somehow I need to grow another arm when I am trying to siphon the whey out of the vat! Two hands does not seem enough to keep one end in the whey, and pull the turkey baster out of the tube at the other end, without whey going everywhere!

jwalker: The $6.99 a gallon is for pasteurized milk, not raw. For raw milk it is about $20 a gallon. Living in California costs more!
In order to save some cash on this venture, I think I will need to try nonfat milk and cream instead.

[cowboycheese]

Great job. Hope it works out and do update us when you finally cut into it - or pull a sample with a taster. A cheese for you!

You might want to try a larger ladle instead of the turkey baster. I've got several sizes from a local restaurant supply for almost nothing. The 12oz one is my favorite for bailing out whey from a pot.

[Spoons]

I even cut back a bit on the starter as you recommended, with 3/8 tsp total rather than 1/2 tsp. Maybe I need to invest in one of the mini-scales and weigh it instead!

Scasnerkay,

I made another 4lbs gouda today and reduced the culture quantities from previous makes and only got to press 3.5 hours before reaching 5.4ph.
This time I used
3/16 tsp MM100
1/8 Aroma B
and 1/32 Holdbac LC
For a total of about : 5/16 tsp, slightly over 1/4 tsp.

Almost the same quantity that I used in my 2LBS makes, but then I used to press about 4.5 hours... I haven't purchased new cultures in between, so they're from the same packets. I just don't get it...

[scasnerkay]

Now at 3 weeks out. Weight 3#14 oz. Smells nice! Cleaned off some blue spots and some pinkish and white stuff. The rind is still not dry enough to bag it. Which unfortunately means I do not have enough room in my cave to make more cheese yet...  When I seal it, I can put it in the part of the cave which gets wet. I need a new cave.....