Author Topic: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015  (Read 3842 times)

LoftyNotions

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Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« on: April 08, 2015, 08:19:59 PM »
You know how, sometimes when your brain is on cruise control, and you ask it to do some math? And it says, “Yeah, I can do that.”? But it stays in cruise control? More on that in a minute…

My recipe is a mashup from several sources, with most of it being inspired by the Alp/Al efforts here. Additional input came from CHR Hansen, and a couple others.

This was an 8 gallon make, started at about 9:00 AM. Brought milk up to temperature with culture cubes floating merrily. Added CaCl and P. shermanii while milk was heating. PH at 90 °F was 6.53 (with bulk cultures melted).

As soon as the milk was up to temperature I added the rennet. Floc time was 12 minutes, and with 3X factor, cut curds to approximately 1 inch and let them rest a couple minutes. Started stirring with a whisk, aiming for a ¼ inch cut. Curds were already starting to clump after another 20 minutes or so of stirring. Heated milk to 122 to 123°F over about 35 minutes, so temperature rise control was good.

Curds got REALLY sticky during the planned ½ hour stir. By the time the pH was down to 6.4, the curds were past the sticky point and very firm. If I had it to do over, I wouldn’t have worried about pH, and would probably have settled the curds right after heating, based on curd texture and stickiness.

After consolidating curds, transferred them to the 8 inch mold and started pressing under whey, with 10 pounds for 10 minutes X2 and 20 pounds for 20 minutes once. Removed mold from whey and pressed at 40 pounds for 30 minutes.

Remember the math skills mentioned above? Alp specifically says 8 pounds of weight per pound of cheese. Easy! 8 gallons of milk should give an 8 pound cheese. 8 pound cheese? 8 pounds of weight per? Yep. 80 pounds.  And to make matters even worse, I didn’t get 8 pounds of cheese, my curds were so dry.

Oh well. Continuing the saga… Pressed and re-dressed at slowly extending intervals until pH was at 5.4, which happened at around 11:00 this morning. (26 hours).

8 gallons of milk only yielded 2600 grams of cheese, for about a 9% yield. I’m sure this is solely due to over-cooking. The cheese is being dry salted with 27 grams of salt as we speak. Then heading for cool storage and daily baths.

Sorry about the dearth of photos for this one. It seemed like I was busier than usual.

Larry

Offline Al Lewis

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #1 on: April 08, 2015, 08:31:55 PM »
The reduced fat milk will reduce the weight of the cheese.  You would never get an 8 pound cheese using that mixture of milk.  Nice looking cheese though!! Beautiful knit!!! ;D
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Stinky

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #2 on: April 08, 2015, 09:05:34 PM »
Very pretty! :)

LoftyNotions

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #3 on: May 24, 2015, 06:31:41 PM »
OK, so after a couple weeks cooling its heels in the cave, I brought it out into room temperature (70° to 72° F.)  Affinage consisted of washing every 1 to 2 days with a wine-brine mixture. All critters that grew on it were indigenous.

I discussed my brain-farts during this make in my first post. In addition, the P. shermanii I used was probably 3 years old. It took a full 3 weeks to see any swelling, at which time I put it back in the cave. Today was cut day, and I've gotta say I'm as happy with this cheese as I've ever been with any other I've made. Hole structure is reasonable, and the flavor, even at this young age, is excellent. Age will only make it better. It'll be interesting to see if new P. shermanii will speed up the hole formation in my next make.

Larry

Stinky

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #4 on: May 24, 2015, 07:16:59 PM »
So you cut it at 1 1/2 months?

LoftyNotions

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #5 on: May 24, 2015, 07:22:20 PM »
I did, since I didn't want the rind to develop further. For solid cheeses like Parmesan, I'll vacuum bag it in one piece. For a cheese with internal holes, vacuuming it in one piece would tend to tear it apart.

Larry

shaneb

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #6 on: May 25, 2015, 12:13:35 AM »
Yum! It looks brilliant. I'd love to make a cheese that big one of these days. Have a cheese from me.

Shane

Kern

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #7 on: May 25, 2015, 02:31:46 AM »
I love the rind.  This alone is worth a cheese!   ;)  Was the eight gallon batch done in one or two shifts?

LoftyNotions

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #8 on: May 25, 2015, 03:29:00 AM »
Kern, it was 1 batch in a 10 gallon pot, direct fired over gas. Thanks for the cheese.

Larry

Offline Boofer

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #9 on: May 25, 2015, 11:31:15 PM »
Another fine effort! Nice eyes.

...but really young!!  :o

If you're really concerned about over-development of the rind, you could consider cream-coating it. That would slow rind drying and help preserve moisture.

Have a cheese for those sweet-looking eyes. :)

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John@PC

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #10 on: May 28, 2015, 06:29:10 PM »
Another cheese as well dittoing all previous comments.  That is a young'un.  I do like you and cut my emmental at a fairly young age (usually 2 - 3 mo.) and vac bag what I don't eat.  I love to see how the flavor develops - all-ways seems to get better over time for some reason ::).

LoftyNotions

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #11 on: May 28, 2015, 06:39:35 PM »
Thanks Boofer and John.

I agree with you both that this was really young to be cut. Part of my rationale for doing it was that I felt I over-cooked the curd on this one. After pressing, moisture content was pretty low. The next one will sit around getting mellow for a while longer. :)

Larry

Alpkäserei

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #12 on: May 31, 2015, 02:47:37 PM »
Nice looking cheese.

A few things,

Curds for an Emmentaler should be very dry. You are not going to get 8 pounds of Emmentaler from 8 gallons of milk. That rule only is true for a semi-hard type of cheese. Emmentaler is a hard cheese = drier curds, lower yield, longer life

As for rind development, after a few months the rind will not develop any more. The thickness and such of the rind is determined entirely in the first 10 days of its existence. So cutting it and bagging it to stop rind development is not actually helpful. After the first weeks, all we do with the rind is dry it out a little.


LoftyNotions

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Re: Emmentalish Make 4_7_2015
« Reply #13 on: May 31, 2015, 03:52:12 PM »
Thanks Alp, that's excellent information. I misspoke when I said rind development. I guess what I was really talking about was the cheese drying out further.

Larry