Peeking in from out of the shadows, un autre newbie from Ohio, USA

[mosborn]

Hi Cheesemakers,

Thanks for having this forum.  I have been enjoying it and I'm learning and getting ideas for a few weeks now, so I reckon it's good manners to come in and say hello.

I started a couple of months ago.  I was working on a project to eat complete, well-balanced, fully nutritious food for an average of $5 a day.  Well, that project is wonderfully successful (it's coming in less than $4 a day) - and as part of all that my son suggested, "Why not learn to make your own cheese?"  OK, seemed interesting, so why not, indeed?

Yeah, I've read the thread on whether it saves money -- I'm not here to get into that right now (I think it does).  Just talking about how I got interested.    I bought cultures and a kit from thecheesemaker.com and away we go.

My boy was most interested in starting with camembert/brie, and he's made several of those, I think they are working well.  He made a big one (started out about 7 1/4 inches in diameter, from 2 gallons, and flattened out so far - like a big cow patty - but I do think it might work), too.

I started with a couple of 1-gallon blues.  They are wrapped in cellophane in my fridge right now.

I made a 4 gallon swiss infused with giant puffball mushroom.  My profile pic is that cheese when it was brand new about a few weeks ago.  It smells awesome now, and I might be imagining a little swelling going on, it's got a nice rind and is sitting on a board in my kitchen.  It weights about 3 and a half pounds now.

I made a weird one one day in a fit of what I will self-flatteringly call creativity.  I used mesophilic starter, and penicillium candidum, and flavored it with saffron and sharp paprika, and I don't even remember what cheese recipe I used -- I think I bastardized it...   removed a lot of whey and added hot water to cook the curds and pressed it overnight.  It's a cheese, though, certainly.  It's unorthodox, just as certainly.   It smells good and it's aging, and I'm looking forward to trying it out at Saturnalia.   it's got some white mold coming out the sides -- the P. candidum?

AND...  yeah, this goes on just a little more...  OK, I tried a lavender cheese.  I soaked lavender buds in a gallon of milk as it was heating and ripening, using a Monterey Jack recipe.   I do think I got a little delicate lavender infusion, but it didn't really turn purple like I'd hoped, and the flavor seemed to be very, very light.   I'd like to try again with a stronger infusion, but I have to try to learn bout how to get a good strong lavender infusion into the milk.  I've been studying it, and I'll try again.  the cheese dried out a few days in my kitchen, and now it's wrapped and in my refrigerator.  It's another one for Saturnalia.

I've been working on making my own rye crackers for the party, too.  I pretty much got my whole wheat sourdough bread worked out properly, so that's not a problem.

And my cheap, jailhouse wine will work.   

WOOHoo! 

I want to make more Swiss, that's great fun.  And I want to try a juniper berry infusion!  That one should be a jack, right?  or a brick?   

And blue.  Bleu.  I love blue cheese, so I'll make more of that.

Oh, I forgot to mention I got my Mom interested.  She made a one gallon cheese using for a starter a cup or two of of culture she grew from a half-inch cube of Fontina.  THAT should be interesting -- it's aging in her garage now.

I enjoyed the movie, "The Cheese Nun."  I wanted to put my hands in the curds!   

[justsocat]

Welcome, mosborn!
I like the way you live your cheesemaking
I'm curious what's it you eat for $4 a day?

[mosborn]

Thanks, Pavel

I eat rice - speaking of which, my mom suggested that I can use whey to cook my rice.  I had so much whey, and I am loathe to throw it out, and I can only drink so much.  So the whey is really good to use instead of water to cook rice.  Brown rice.

And beans -- I learned that I can use whey to cook the beans, too.     delicious!

and chicken... and canned salmon, and mackerel, and sardines, and ground beef, and beef liver, and canned oysters, and fresh fruit, lots of apples, and bananas, and collard greens, and nuts, and almonds, and I make my own whole wheat bread and essene bread --  really, I eat a lot of widely varied food for less than $4 a day!  It's all about paying careful attention to getting all the recommended nutrients - I'm getting them all without resorting to supplements, except for the vitamin D that is already added to the milk I buy.  I eat oats and milk and sunflower seeds, sweet potatoes, make my own sauerkraut, ....  It's weird, the less money I spend on food, the more food I have.  It's a challenge to consume it all before it goes bad, and to find room to keep it all!    I was keeping very exact records of what I was eating, and portions, and the nutrients and percent of US recommended allowances and so on for two months.   I was thinking about making a website and ebook with that information.

 My son tried mozerella, and later i tried it.  Using the 30 minute recipe from Ricki's "Home Cheesemaking."   It made cheese, but so far it's not like the mozz I see in stores.  I think maybe I haven't got it hot enough.  I may need to buy some silicone gloves or something.  Or maybe use real citric acid instead of trying to use citrus juice?

Now I'm starting to culture some yogurt from some I bought at the store.  Seems to be working.  I think there are other cheeses i can make with yogurt culture?  Is that right?

[Sailor Con Queso]

Nice looking wheel. What kind of hoop (mold) are you using?

[mosborn]

Hi Sailor -- thanks!

Well....   sheepish looks here...   Uhm...  OK, part of the fun I'm having with the cheesemaking is the inventiveness I've employed, walking around Home Depot and Walmart, and Restaurant Equippers, and thrift stores, using my imagination to try to come up with cheesemaking equipment.

OK, for this wheel I used a one-gallon plastic bucket I got when I went blueberry picking this year.  I used a hot nail to make drain holes (see the rivets? ) and I used a second, identical bucket as the press, filling it with water, and then putting more weight on top of that.  So the mold isn't exactly cylindrical, which I would prefer, it's tapered slightly,  but it does seem to work.   

I'll get a picture of the cheese as it is today when I get home.  The rivets are gone now.  I'll get a picture of my improvised mold, too.

[Sailor Con Queso]

I LOVE cheap, practical solutions. Nice job, and no press needed. How did you keep the curds from escaping around the sides of the bucket that you were pressing with?

[mosborn]

Sailor wrote: "How did you keep the curds from escaping around the sides of the bucket..."

This is why I should keep records.   I forget.  hahha...   Either the pressing bucket fit just right (it was identical to the molding bucket) or maybe I put a couple of plastic grocery bags over it to sort of fill in the gap.   Sorry about that.

I recognize the value of keeping good records for cheesemaking; it's just that it's a value that competes with the high value I put on doing things easy and quick and lazy-like.

I keep thinking, "Oh, I'll start keeping records of my processes with my next cheese, or maybe two or three cheeses from now."

I always hated record-keeping.  I wonder if I could learn to like it enough to do me some good.

[mosborn]

Here are the pictures I said I would post.

The cheese as it is today (same cheese that's currently in my profile), and the mold I made it with, made from a blueberry bucket.

[Cheese Head]

Hi mosborn, great 1st post!

Love the double bucket idea for mold as has built in press, just load the top bucket up with water or other weights!

Yogurt is a common Thermophilic Starter Culture normally used to mak cooked type cheeses.

Great to hear you are having fun making cheeses, what's "Saturnalia"?

[mosborn]

Thanks, John.

I do think I'll be trying yogurt as a thermophilic starter.   

I bought two kinds of yogurt at the store last night.  One was plain yogurt with some cornstarch or gelatin in it -- it was the plainest they had at walmart.  The other was a liquid thing with a couple of cultures the plain one didn't have.

I tried culturing them.  I did one with just the plain, one with just the strawberry-flavored liquid one, and one with a mix.  I think they all worked, the plain one is just right, though.  I think that's the one I'll be using and propagating.  The other one is still liquid, even though I think the cultures grew. 

Saturnalia is winter holiday, lasts a week -- it was celebrated before there was Christmas.    It starts on Dec. 17.  As Wikipedia says, "It was marked by tomfoolery."     Sounds good to me!

[DeejayDebi]

Welcome mosborn. I like your creativity!

[RadioFlyer]

Welcome mosborn! All I an say is, WOW, you really hit the ground running!! That's great and very inspiring to me as a newbie. I'll be watching your posts for new ideas.  Do you buy all your milk from the store?

[mosborn]

Hi Kim,

Thanks     So far I buy all my milk from the store, and so far no fancy milk - but I am pretty sure that one of these days I'll be trying different kinds of milk.  I was hoping to find some goat milk at Whole Foods the other day (I have a whole thing about that store - I get kind of defensive when I go in there, but they have some things I want) - but the only goat milk I saw there was ultra-pasteurized, so I didn't buy it.  I was kind of interested in trying the pasteurized but not homogenized milk, but not at over $4 for half-a-gallon.

I know there are different milks around here.  I might have to drive out to the country.

[RadioFlyer]

And please post a photo of the cheese with the puffball inside when you cut it open. I am so jealous! I used to get puffballs all over our property but I haven't seen one in years.

[Parselmouth]

I rigged up a similar arrangement which I used to drain off my stiltons. I bought a 24 litre plastic storage box, oblong, about 6 inches deep and 20 inches long and drilled holes all around the bottom and about an inch and a half up the sides.

I have a much bigger old toy storage box in rigid plastic which I also use as a water bath, and in this I put an upturned bucket to rest the 24 litre box on, keeps it above the draining whey. Line it with boiled cheesecloth, and put the curds in there to drain off. Works a treat and has enabled me to double the quantity of milk I'm working with. All sterilised with baby bottle steriliser.