Hello,
I have been making cheese for a year now, but in the last 6 months I encountered a problem that I cannot overcome.
I follow the recipe for cheddar or leicester. I add cultures, stir wait, add rennet, stir wait.
The top of the rennet gives a clean break. A few inches down however, the rennet becomes grainy mush.
The top curds, that were nice little squares begin to break apart soon, while stirring slowly and everything soon becomes grainy mush.
It started 6 months ago and has happened with every.single.batch.
This is what I tried to do so far:
1) Stir longer with up and down motions to distribute the rennet (up to 4 minutes on last batch)
2) Increase amount of rennet
3) Increase amount of calcium
4) Change milk 2 times ( all three types of milk have worked before - pasteurized and homogenized - one is cream top)
5) Change rennet twice
6) Use different cultures
7) Increase/decrease amount of culture
Increase/decrease temperature at which rennet sets
9) Increase amount of wait time after adding rennet (currently 90 min)
10) Use non-chlorinated water to dilute the rennet
I just don't understand, how the top can always be rock slid with a clean break and then turn to mush on the bottom.
Please help!
I don't know what to do anymore.