Author Topic: Funny looking and earthy smelling Tome  (Read 1404 times)

sanj

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Funny looking and earthy smelling Tome
« on: September 17, 2014, 10:16:10 AM »
Dear cheese makers

 Please find attached a photo of my 2 month old TOME cheese made with full cream pasteurised cows milk. It has been stored at 13 degrees ( and under ) for the past 2 months. It is my first attempt at this style of cheese. It has a yellow outer with some cracks and  lots of different coloured moulds growing - blue/grey/yellow and has a strong earthy smell !!! IS this safe to eat or should I abandon ship and feed to the neighbours cat now ??

would appreciate any advice

Sanjiv

Offline Andrew Marshallsay

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Re: Funny looking and earthy smelling Tome
« Reply #1 on: September 17, 2014, 12:37:15 PM »
Hi Sanjiv

It's certainly an ugly looking beggar but I don't know that I'd be writing it off just yet. Given the yellow colour, the smell could be due to Brevibacterium Linens which is not dangerous. Did the surface turn slimy?
I'd be cutting it open and seeing what is happening on the inside. It may well be that the moulds are only on the surface and the cracking may be due to proteolysis from B Linens (in which case the paste under the rind will be soft, perhaps runny).
On the other hand I can't say for sure that it is safe although you did use pasteurised milk which must be some reassurance. I will be interested to see if any of our more experienced contributers have an opinion on that.
As to whether you feed it to the neighbour's cat, that might depend on how you feel about said moggy.
- Andrew

JeffHamm

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Re: Funny looking and earthy smelling Tome
« Reply #2 on: September 19, 2014, 08:11:21 AM »
As long as the cracks aren't letting the rind flora into the paste of the cheese, you should be fine.  Here's my current Tomme:

http://cheeseforum.org/forum/index.php/topic,12717.15.html

looks like you've got B.linens (the orange stuff).  You can see on mine some of that, which is now overgrown with geo (the white mould).   This was made April 13th, and I'll age it out until late November, so around 8 months.  Anyway, get the humidity up enough to prevent cracking, and it should be fine.  Before eating, you can wash the orange rind off by using a soft bristle brush and scrub it under running water.  Or, just slice the rind off with a knife (this, of course, is assuming you don't care for the rind, which some people like).

- Jeff

John@PC

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Re: Funny looking and earthy smelling Tome
« Reply #3 on: September 19, 2014, 09:59:54 PM »
IS this safe to eat or should I abandon ship and feed to the neighbours cat now ??
I sometimes let my cat Cotton sample my cheese.  Turns out she likes what what my wife likes (which means all things not stinky).  I guess it's a gender thing ::)

sanj

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Re: Funny looking and earthy smelling Tome
« Reply #4 on: September 20, 2014, 10:02:31 AM »
thanks for the advice. I'll let it live and look forward to sampling it in another month or so