Hello from Steve in Eugene, Oregon

[2WheelFun]

I'm a new cheese maker with just a dozen or two decent quick cheeses under my belt and two aging failures.  Your forum was a great discovery.  I found it with an online search attempting to better understand those aging problems, described below. 

My nearly unstructured schedule allows plenty of time to play with home gardening and food projects but a very limited budget for store-bought equipment.  Our small backyard garden doesn't supply us with most of our calories, but it probably provides most of our nutrition.  We're avid canners and I've experimented with and enjoyed cider and beer brewing and making lacto-fermented foods such as pickles, sauerkraut and kimchi.  Now that I don't drink alcohol, cheesemaking seemed like a great new cultured food to learn about!  Plus my wife loves cheese like nobody's business.  The only cheese she's ever disliked was gjetost. 

Anyway, thanks for all the great posts and expertise!  It will be an ongoing help for sure.

Aging problems: Blue and grey molds on my natural-rind gouda and gruyere.  At the time I didn't understand selectively allowing surface molds to grow and figured the more, the better!  Oops!  Still trying to wrap my brain around this whole affinage thing.  Haven't tried the 2-month old 1 lb goudas yet (a bit afraid to try them) but the 1/2 lb gruyeres tasted like bad mold all the way to the core.  Aged at 50-55 F for about 2 months in a cooler, swapping out gallons of milk from the fridge daily as a temperature control.  Without a hygrometer on hand I tried mimicking a psychrometer with a single thermometer, taking a dry reading, followed by a wet reading in a wet cotton ball.  This indicated something between 85-90% humidity.  I should clarify that I did try straight white vinegar on the cat's hair that cropped up a little bit in the first few weeks but didn't try to do anything with the blue and white molds until about 6 weeks in, when I bought a soft plastic mushroom brush and started brushing the wheels a few times a week to reduce the bloom.  I'm concerned it's too late to correct what the molds may have done to the flavor of the interior, like we experienced with the gruyere.  The pics below show the primitive "cheese cave" and the gouda today after brushing. 

 Am I understanding correctly that blue molds are a problem with excessive humidity?  Should I have kept all molds off the surface of the gouda with a salt/vinegar rub?  I know there is a waxing option but I'm trying to branch out to natural rinds when possible.  Thanks again!

[Al Lewis]

Welcome Steve!!  You should hook up with H-K-J.  He lives down there also. AC4U!

[Fritz]

Hi Steve, welcome!
Mastering natural rinds is a little on the advanced skill part of the cheese making learning curve and so don't feel bad for things not quite turning out the first time keep at it, and learn by doing ...

At first, I thought your rind of the ball cheese (Gouda?) looked pretty good. I'm sure you are having a challenge with rind and cheese size ... 1/2 lb cheese with natural mold rind would be quite tricky... A larger cheese would probably fair better. Again, keep at it and let's see what others think

[smolt1]

Hi Steve
I'm just up the hill in Oakridge. You have come to the best place for cheese making advice!
Bob

[H-K-J]

Welcome Steve!!  You should hook up with H-K-J.  He lives down there also.

I do, I do, about an hour or so south of you 
Oh, BTW welcome to the forum,

[awakephd]

Welcome, Steve! This forum is bulging with helpful hints, helpful recipes, and helpful people! (We're bulging because, well, we like to eat LOTS of cheese!)

As Fritz alluded to, one of the significant issues with your mold experience is the small size of the cheese. I'd recommend not trying a natural rind until you get up to at least a 2-lb. cheese, and larger would be better, so that your rind-to-paste ratio is much, much smaller.

So, how do you avoid the mold on the smaller cheeses? Several options: 1) stay after it, scrubbing with vinegar or white wine to keep the molds away. 2) wax it. 3) vacuum-bag it.

Of the three, the last is by far the easiest, though usually 2) or 3) involves at least a bit of 1) at the early stages, because generally you want to let the cheese develop a bit before bagging or waxing.

[2WheelFun]

Thanks all for the warm welcome and the advice!

Ah, rind-to-paste ratio is a new concept for me, but it makes good sense!  I hav an as-yet-unused larger mold so I'll save my next natural rind attempt for that size wheel.  I'll work with the vinegar and try the white wine.  Thanks Fritz and awakephd for the insights. 

Al Lewis, H-K-J and Smolt1, thanks for the "shout-out" and I hope to learn from all of you! 

[Boofer]

rind-to-paste ratio

-Boofer-

[valley ranch]

Greetings Steve, Tell you the truth. If you were just a bit closer to Lake Tahoe I'd bring a bottle of wine, and ,as Awakephd has mentioned, try to talk you into scrubbing that ball of cheese and maybe slicing in so we could have a taste. I'd bring some good bread and olives as well .
I've done natural rind a few time because I didn't know any better and had pretty good luck, I didn't eat that rind, They were small cheeses, they'd have been larger had I been by this site and heard they should be.

Well, look for you in the threads and posts. Have a good one.

Richard

[2WheelFun]

Hello valley ranch!  You have some insight or courage I lacked because it turned out to be pretty darned edible!  My wife and I cut into this after about 2 1/2 months of age and found some edible cheese in the middle    It went great with ciabatta, avocado, homemade pickles and fresh cukes on our 10th anniversary picnic atop Oregon's Castle Rock with a stunning view of the Three Sisters mountains, and of course, a view of my lovely bride.  Hubba, hubba! No pics, I'm afraid...

It didn't remind me of gouda.  Bitey (like it had a bit of lipase) and crumbly so I'm thinking way more acid than a typical gouda? We haven't cut into the 2nd wheel of this batch yet. Maybe at the 4 month mark?  Unfortunately it did have a distinct bad mold flavor for about 3/8" in from the rind, which we discarded.

Hopefully the new gouda wheel, with surface molds treated per awakephd's recommendations will be part of the progression towards better and better cheese!  The new pH meter helped a lot on this new 4 lb. wheel (the flat one shown below).The pH was 5.40-5.45 going into the brine immediately after pressing, so I'm hoping it could be a creamier texture?  Onward and hopefully upward!

[awakephd]

Yes, getting it into the brine at 5.4 should give you a smooth, flexible paste. But as long as it's edible, it is a success regardless -- so AC4U (which means, a thumbs up)!

[2WheelFun]

Woo hoo, my first cheese!, Thanks, awakephd!

[valley ranch]

2WheelFun, Just found my way back to this thread and saw you cut into and enjoyed that cheese. Good for you guys.

Was that rind mold something you inoculated or volunteered?

I just found out how to tell if there has been an answer to a thread, a bit slow at times.

Have a good one.

Richard

[Martin]

Never give up on a cheese. You may have simply invented a new recipe that everyone wants to copy.