Sticheltonesque (Stilton in disguise) cheese making

[mikey687]

I come from Leicestershire in the UK, the home of Stilton, so it's been one of my goals at cheese making to produce one of these.

My first attempt is looking like a small grumpy old man at the moment but may taste OK in a couple of weeks - hopefully.

For my second attempt I became fascinated by the Stichelton story (www.stichelton.co.uk). This is a dairy in the UK that is making raw milk versions of Stilton commercially, and because they use raw milk they cannot call it Stilton.

They have a really great website and a cheese that I have never tasted but one day I have to as it looks awesome. They use very little culture to let the raw milks character come through, do a very slow acidification and mature it for a longer 4 months.

I've tried to bring together all of the knowledge I can find about Stichelton (and Stilton making in general) into my second attempt and I've just got it to the drying out / starting maturation stage. It's looking very promising so I've written up all my current make notes here for anyone who might be interested. I'll add to this as it matures but I'm not planning on piercing it and cracking it open for a few months yet so this will be a slow steady set of updates.

Waiting for this one is going to be difficult...

[mikey687]

For those without PDF viewers...

[Mermaid]

beautiful notes!! and a lovely looking cheese. AC4U!

[Al Lewis]

It is my understanding, it could be wrong, that Stilton was originally made from raw milk.  Then the government made the creameries switch to pasteurized milk.  When they again allowed raw milk they could not call the cheese Stilton because Stilton was now being made with pasteurized milk so they had to rename the raw milk version to Stichelton.  If that is correct then the raw milk version IS the original Stilton.  At any rate I'm currently making a small 4 pound one for a friend.  One of my favorite cheeses.  Yours looks great!

[mikey687]

Yes, that's what I understood too.

And apparently (buried on the website somewhere I think), when they set up the Stichelton dairy, they had some help/advice from the people from one of the original dairies that used to make raw milk Stiltons.

It all seems to be a bit of a raw nerve for the owners of the Stilton name though, as it is now part of the PDO that only pasteurised milk is used to make a Stilton and only in the three counties in the centre of the UK - so I'm obviously making my own interpretation of this great cheese.

I wonder what I'll call it.

[mikey687]

That's a nice looking Cheese Al! I hope mine is looking as good soon!

Thank you for the cheese Mermaid!

[Al Lewis]

I just call mine good.  LOL  Here's one I did in 2012.  Six lovely pounds of Stiltonesque cheese.

[mikey687]

Wow!

I have cheese envy!

One day maybe I'll be able to pull something like that off 

Please have a belated cheese from me as that one will always be worthy!

[Al Lewis]

I really like the look of yours.  I need to find an 8 pound tall mold so I can make a large cheese with the correct proportions, like yours!    AC4U

[mikey687]

10 days into the maturation and it's slow and steady!

I've been trying to follow the Stichelton website recommendations for the first two weeks to try and promote the ambient yeasts on the rind instead of the more aggressive blue. Shooting for a relative humidity close to 80-85%.

I'm happy that I can see some pink and whites developing slowly but the blues are trying hard to establish.

The smell change was interesting, first few days it was close to a strong old cheddar rind, then some blue notes appeared but now it's starting to smell very mellow with no particularly strong notes.

I'm going to keep this going for a couple more weeks to see what happens to the rind. I'm hoping to get the yellow, pink, whites, and browns of a good Stichelton with the bouncy soft rind consistency (hope that makes sense) from their video.

[Kern]

I really like the look of yours.  I need to find an 8 pound tall mold so I can make a large cheese with the correct proportions, like yours!    AC4U

Al, mikey687's mold looks like a straight sided polycarbonate mold.  His notes indicate that it is about 6 inches in diameter and 12 inches high.  John at Perfect Cheese http://www.perfect-cheese.com/ could fix you up with one of these.  Mikey used about 20 liters of raw milk (~5.5 gallons) and from the picture it looks like he filled his mold to about 9 inches with wet curd.  I've got an eight inch high mold from John and the inside diameter is about 5.75 inches.  It ought to be able to give me a Stilton with near perfect proportions.   

Kern 

[Al Lewis]

Thanks for the info Kern!  Mikey687  That looks incredible.  If you check back on that 4 pound thread I posted I put my piercing routine in there.  I would not pierce through the top if I had a cheese with the proportions of yours.  Looks perfect! After watching the video of the machines that pierce Stiltons I found that they pierce at 30° up and down.  They always stop short of center too.  Anyway, I posted a link to the video on there if you'd be interested in watching it.  From the looks of your cheese I'd say you have it all sussed though!

[mikey687]

Thanks Al!

Also, thanks for the link to the video. I've probably watched it about 10 times already but only on the Stilton associations website and they have it at an incredibly small size, your copy is an actual useful size.

I've still got some time till I want to pierce it as I'd like to let it mature slowly for a couple of months to bring out the subtle flavors before activating the blue mould inside, but I'm going to follow your 30 degree suggestion from the sides - I'd not picked that up from the video.

I've taken a couple of pictures of my mini cave arrangement for this one: A big plastic box on it's side with a cheese cloth 4th wall instead of the lid, all kept in a cold storage room.

I'm finding this coupled with some tubs of super saturated Potassium Chloride Brine (85% RH sinks) are helping to keep the RH in a good place. I'd not thought about it before hand but the cheese cloth "wall" is probably doing a good job of enabling waste gases to slowly bleed out of the aging environment.

[Al Lewis]

The cheesecloth wall will also help to contain the blue mold from spreading throughout the room.  I often lightly wrap my blues in a single layer of cheesecloth in my cave to help keep the roqueforte to itself.

[Frodage3]

Hiya Mikey,
This Stichelton and your first Gorgonzola look absolutely fantastic! Great job!