Author Topic: Emmental-like 2  (Read 5042 times)

John@PC

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Emmental-like 2
« on: September 29, 2014, 09:01:08 PM »
This was inspired by Paul's Abondance post as I've wanted to get another alpine cheese in the cave but I'm going to have to go back get some more "cheese 202" courses before I tackle that one.  Instead I picked a larger-eyed cheese (Gianiclis's recipe for Emmental) that one I've done once before but it was back in my learning stages.  I had just done a Gruyere and when I was reading the recipe I was thinking "I just made that!" - kind of like a Gruyere with some proprionic tossed in  :)

Ingredients:
- 4 gal. LTP / NH milk from Hickory Hill Farms, SC
- Thermo B (1/2 tsp)
-  LH100 (pinch)
-  Thermo C (1/8 tsp)  I added this because my LH100 was a bit long in the tooth and I wanted to make sure I had some LB in there
-  Proprionic bacteria (1/8 tsp) a bit more than recommended because it's like my LH100
-  Heavy brine

Make:
  Warmed milk to 90F
  Added cultures; let rehydrate 5 min.
  Stir in with wisk
  Let still 5 min (no additional ripening time required)
  Add NaCl diluted in 1/4 cup cool non-chlorinated water and stir
  Add single strength rennet diluted in 1/4 cup cool non-chlorinated water and stir
  Floc occured at 20 min.
  Used floc factor of 2.5 so total wait time for curd formation was 50 min.
  Cut curds using 1/2" square cutter making 3 passes to get 1/4" cubes
  Rest 5 min.
  Increase temperature to 122F over 40 min. while stirring
  Held 122F stirring for 10 min. at which time pH was 6.4
  Let curds settle and drained whey
  Broke up curds with hands and loaded a cloth-lined 8" diameter clear bottomless cylindrical mold
  Added pressure as needed to maintain a consistent whey drip rate and achieve good consolidation until target pH of 5.4

Pressing schedule:
15 min @ 5 lb.
20 min @ 10 lb.
30 min @ 20 lb.
1 hr @ 35 lb.
2.5 hr @ 45 lb. without cloth or mesh (to target pH of 5.4)

Brined in med. heavy brine overnight
Put in 55F 85% RH cave; plan to begin b-linens brush wash @ 1 week; age longer than I've done previous alpines (at least 6 mo.).

Notes:  Everything went great with this make pretty much hitting every time, temperature and pH mark. I'm trying to pay more attention to pH and have to say it does have it's rewards.  In this case it helped me to extrapolate the pressing time so I could have a 2+ hour naked press to smooth things out - just checked pH every hour or so until it hit 5.4.  I included a graph of pH progression and plan to do that with more cheeses. 

Also, I saw an error in the graph.  Curds were cooked for 45 min. and stirred for 15 min. until 6.4 pH for total of 1 hr. before draining instead of 3 hrs. in the graph.  I'll check and add the corrected one.

« Last Edit: September 30, 2014, 08:17:14 PM by John@PC »

John@PC

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #1 on: September 30, 2014, 08:31:34 PM »
Here's the corrected pH graph.

Spoons

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #2 on: October 01, 2014, 03:01:54 AM »
Love the graph! Very pro! A cheese for you, John :)

The pickle jar kept you company? ;) Nice setup BTW!

Spoons

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #3 on: October 01, 2014, 03:06:48 AM »
You know what, John? You inspired me. I'm taking the hobby to another level and I'll start making PH progression graphs and Texture/taste "spider-web" charts.

John@PC

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #4 on: October 01, 2014, 12:00:33 PM »
The pickle jar kept you company? ;) Nice setup BTW!
Actually our local fresh produce farm (the best farm storefront in this part of the country and where I get my LTP / NH milk for less than $5 a gal.) was selling baskets of pickle-size cucumbers for $6 and I found a really good recipe for a Claussen knock-off.  So every time I went back to get milk I would get a couple more baskets.  Ready for the winter with plenty of pickles and cheese ;).

Offline awakephd

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #5 on: October 01, 2014, 02:40:39 PM »
John,

The results are looking good! AC4U.

Do you have a write up somewhere of the equipment you are using to heat the milk?
-- Andy

John@PC

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #6 on: October 01, 2014, 03:18:19 PM »
Thanks for the cheese Andy.  I've listed below the basic equipment I use almost exclusively now.  Note that I started with a 2/3 size pan when I got away from round pots and made bunches of 2 gal. makes but found that the 8" deep full size pan is fine for anything from 1 to 6 lbs.  The nice thing about the long pan is it's great for cheddaring or draining mozzerella by just placing a dish towel under one end.  The square corners also provide a good way to pour out whey without dripping.  Finally, it's great for storing all of your equipment and for steam sterilizing before starting. 

Equipment for up to 6 gal. batches:
Electric Griddle:  Presto 7047 22" cool touch griddle (full size pan fits like a glove :)) This one should work too but I haven't tried it.
8" deep full size steam table pan (like this one)
Full size clear polycarbonate pan cover like this or SS if you want.

You can use a temperature controller if you want and there are some square curd cutters around  :) that can speed things up a bit.

Offline awakephd

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #7 on: October 01, 2014, 10:02:15 PM »
Yeah, I heard about those cutters! :)

I was particularly interested in whether you were controlling the temperature in some way other than manually. Is that a temp controller in the corner of one of the pictures?
-- Andy

John@PC

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #8 on: October 01, 2014, 10:44:12 PM »
I was particularly interested in whether you were controlling the temperature in some way other than manually. Is that a temp controller in the corner of one of the pictures?
  Yes that's the controller we make.  It's basically a thermostat that we designed primarily for controlling refrigerator of freezer sized caves in cooling mode, but can be a help with heating milk in heating mode.  There are many others to select from: Johnsons Controls, Ranco and others out there and ours isn't much different in function except it does have an audible alarm and we can include a food-safe temperature probe.  That said it's an on-off (not PID) controller and takes a bit of practice to control time-temperature when cooking curds.  Hope that answers your question; a lot more to say on the subject of precision heat control but it probably doesn't need to be on this thread - wait..., did I hijack my own thread :o.

John@PC

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #9 on: December 21, 2014, 10:22:30 PM »
Cut this early (only 3 mo.) but wanted to cut up half for Christmas giving and vacuum bag the rest for more aging.  Holes were fairly small but paste was superb and supple and taste was quite good considering the young age.  Much better than earlier attempts :).

Stinky

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #10 on: December 22, 2014, 09:45:27 PM »
Mm, that looks delicious! Well done! AC4U.

John@PC

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #11 on: December 30, 2014, 11:39:57 PM »
Thanks Stinky.  The family liked it on the "Christmas Tray"  :).

Spoons

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Re: Emmental-like 2
« Reply #12 on: December 31, 2014, 05:06:33 PM »
That looks great, John! Nice eye formation too!

A cheese for you!