Hi, I'm new here.
I love cream cheese, and so does the rest of my family. I have access to raw cream, and would love to make a raw cream cheese. I made it once, using 100% cream, (the uncooked recipe from Ricki's book,) at the tail end of winter, and formed a solid curd and make over 2 lb.s of cream cheese. It was amazing. I loved it.
I have now tried 4 times since then and it never formed a curd. I thought it was the temperature not staying steady, but I keep it in a cooler so temperature drops at night won't effect it. I'm just not sure anymore. I just joined this group to get some help, and found a few recipes here calling for mesophilic starter and rennet. I'll try that next time. I use the direct set mesophilic starter. Could it be I'm not stirring enough, or too much? Would the rennet help it to form a curd? I'm buying raw cream from a farmer, and it is very expensive and getting frustrated with the lack of success after my first lucky try.
Any ideas?