cheese sticking to the cheesecloth??

[zenith1]

Cornelius- that's very interesting. By the looks of the cheeses cloth in your pictures it appears only to be a problem on the top or bottom during pressing correct? Which end is giving you a problem, or is it both? I would say that this is not due to a bacterial contaminant though or it would not be just in that spot because the increase in gas pressure would stick the cloth to the sides also. I have not had this problem (probably the only one) so I am also interested in the cause. Maybe the pictures will ring true with another member.

[Cornelius]

Thank's for your input. Yes, the photographs show the cloth sticking to the bottom (the side that sits on the draining board - for which I simply use a cutting board placed over a tray to catch the run-off whey. Should that board be perforated or have groves to drain better? But I guess that would force the cheese into the holes/groves ...). As you correctly note, this particular cheese only tore around the rim and the top surface, but practically not at all along the sides - however, my previous cheese have torn sides as well (possibly due to the fact that my last one was pressed with much less weight and practically half the time). Will let you know once I make that store bought/pasteurized/cow milk cheese ...

[thebelgianpanda]

I have only ever had problems with sides sticking, though occasionally I do have to be careful to release the top and bottom cloth.  I have used raw cow, raw goat (nubian), and store bought.  I haven't a clue as to what is causing your problem now that I see the pics.

[kenjin]

Yes I am having the same problem, its sticking so badly to the cheesecloth, that I am forced to throw them away because the curds are almost glued to it. I tried using different gauge clothes from different companies but it was the same.
Also mine was sticking during the first press,?? now this never happened before when I use to use my home made press which was 2 small buckets with weights on top.
I am making another batch today, this time I will use no cloth because this particular press doesn't have holes in it and the whey simply drains from the bottom.

[Cornelius]

  Now I am even more confused. I was hoping to blame it on the goat's milk, but you mention not having had any trouble with goat's milk? Because I just completed my store bought cow milk's cheese and was successful.

Now, the cow's milk is really terrible in this country (3% fat is the highest you get and it just isn't as nice as the goat's milk you can get. btw, cows milk cheese will remain pure white over here ...), but I simply wanted to test if I am able to make this cheese without tearing the outside.

I added some calcium (but I also do that with the raw goat's milk), I added the same cultures, the PH changes during ripening were the exact same over the same time frame (just about 0.05 change - very little, but supposedly there is little acidity build up during the initial phase of making this cheese), I heated to the exact same temperatures. Now, where I differed slightly is that I used more rennet because I assumed store bought milk will set slower and needs more rennet. And sure enough, even though I used more rennet, I had to give it an extra 20 minutes (total 50 minutes), because it was simply too soft. The recipe does ask for a very soft curd and that is what I ended up with (much softer as a matter of fact than my goat's milk cheese two days ago). Once I ended up stirring, the curd became quite a bit smaller than the goat's milk curd had. I scaled to the same temp and kept it there for the same amount of time, then pressed under whey with 15lbs, flipped and pressed again under whey with 15lbs (5 minutes each). I then dry pressed flipping and increasing the weight at equal rates, only that I maxed out my weight at 65lbs as the cheesecloth wasn't sticking (I was encouraged - with the goat's cheese I had maxed at 45lbs) - I kept it pressed for 12 hours and unmolded without the slightest problem! 

I am still aging the torn cheese (as you can see in the photograph - and there are quite a few more in my cave), but I certainly am far more excited with the perfectly smooth surface of the cheese I made last night (there are only the tiny bumps where the cheese was forced through the draining holes in the mold. Also note, it hasn't been in the brine yet whereas the other one obviously has, hardening the rind a bit). Something to note though is that my yield was considerably less. My last goat's milk cheese with made with 7 liters of milk and yielded 890g out of the press, this one was made with 6 liters and yielded 655g out of the press -  it obviously was pressed with more weight for a longer time, but I could tell when ladling the curds that there was less.

The conclusion? Maybe I need to make sure to cut the goat curds when they are softer and make sure to get them as small as possible in order to trap less moisture. The only other difference was that yesterday I had to move my press into a cooler room (72F) whereas the goat cheese I had left in the kitchen at 82F (the recipe recommends pressing under a higher temperature.

So, I am off in a couple of hours to get myself some more goat's milk and give it another shot - I am not going to give up, this ought to work! Anyone have any insights as to why I have such different results?

[DeejayDebi]

This may be a bit different from the way most people do it but my first few cheeses way back when ... semi hard cheeses if I remember right - they stuck to the cloths and this was very distressing to me so I started pressing in the cloths by hand initially then dumping the curds into pvc pipe moulds without holes or cheese cloth for the first few short pressings just to form the shape and knead the curds. This seemed to solve the problem for me. Once I have flipped the cheese a few times I add the cheese cloth and place the cheese in drilled PVC moulds and continue pressing.

[Cornelius]

Do you still use that process or have you found a trick using cheesecloth? I do think I will give the "no cheesecloth" version a try. As a matter of fact, I had thought that I didn't see anybody else on this forum reporting problems with cheesecloth sticking, but just today I came across several post reporting either similar symptoms or at least hatred towards the use of cheesecloth:

http://cheeseforum.org/forum/index.php/topic,562.msg3045.html#msg3045
http://cheeseforum.org/forum/index.php/topic,754.msg4617.html#msg4617
http://cheeseforum.org/forum/index.php/topic,733.0.html

The funny thing is (as described in my post further up) that I had no difficulties with my pasteurized cow's milk cheese, however, many batches of my raw goat's milk cheese gave me trouble. I was going to run a new batch yesterday, but I reached my farmer to late and gone was the milk (so I ended up getting store bought cow's milk and made some Camembert). My plan is to give it another try mid next week - will post my results.

[DeejayDebi]

One thing I have noticed over the years is some cheese clothes are very open weaved and tend to stick more because of the looseness of the threads. Try to find a fine weaved cheese cloth or linen it works better.

I guess now I do it out of habit - just been doing it that`way for so long now it's like putting sugar in my coffee. I am curious though if it was just the milk I bought at the time or what. I just never went back to using the clothes until most of the whey is pressed out.