Starter culture for Mozzarella

[cheesewiz]

The recipe for mozzarella in "200 Easy Homemade Cheese Recipes" uses direct set thermophilic culture, while the recipes here seem to use either yogurt or buttermilk or both. Does it matter which you use? Can you use the direct set, as you would in other cheese recipes? Thanks!

[linuxboy]

The flavors will be different in using thermo vs meso culture. The big deal with mozzarella is to pack it into a curd and let the acid build up, and then stretch it. This can be done using yogurt, buttermilk, DVI culture, a blend, or directly acidified via vinegar, citric acid, or other acid.

[cheesewiz]

I'm learning so much from this forum. I so appreciate all the information you folks provide!

[iratherfly]

As a rule of thumb, cultured buttermilk makes a good mesophilic. Yogurt makes a good thermophilic.
Use thermophilic when you are dealing with milk at temperatures over 100F (approx) and Mesophilic for everything below that.
I may have some inaccuracies but I am sure Linuxboy can correct my statement. Also look up user Alex - he almost always use nothing but Yogurt and Buttermilk; he can give you a good guidelines on how to choose them and use them (sorry for volunteering you Alex)

[linuxboy]

Yep, except Meso is good to 104F if you need to heat it a bit higher. And thermo is active at 100F, but slow. It's usual use is at 110-120F. It will acidify a mozz, sure, but a thermo will do it slightly faster. You could make a meso mozz and put it in the fridge, for example, to finish acidification. Same thing takes longer with thermo.

Alex's  buttermilk is like flora danica or an aromatic meso because it has diacetylactis. It's a special buttermilk, most of the ones in the US are not that complex.

[iratherfly]

There ya go.
Alex lives in my hometown ...and I know exactly the flavor and consistency of the buttermilk he is using because I grew up on that stuff (people eat it like Yogurt over there). Haven't truly been able to find a good American replacement, but I haven't looked that hard...