Hello all,
I've been lurking and reading for a couple months now and finally have the time to introduce myself.
Coffee Joe is an American from the PNW living in Brazil where my wife and I raise coffee and milk 200 head of Holsteins and Normand's. We have been selling our milk to NESTLÉ for too cheap and for too long. My fondness for a good aged Cheddar, not available here, has had me making some for myself for a couple years.
With lots of positive comments on some of my more successful cheeses, I am ready to start making cheese for real. I will be slowly increasing from my present 1-2 Kg per week
to an eventual who knows. We produce a maximum of 7500 liters per day, so I'll still be delivering milk to Nestlé for a while. Less and less as we get good at this.
I was reading a Climate thread, we are at 3000 ft altitude in the tropical mountains of Minas Gerais. Great Climate. Low in the winter about 5ºC and never hotter than 35ºC on a hot sumer day. Never spent a night without a blanket, a fact our cows like alot.
For now, I am working on an underground cheese cave, 250 ft², I'll have lots of questions on this. I have just purchased a used SS 300 liter hot water cheese vat. Everything else we are going to scale around this piece.
Hoping to get everything going for 30Kg per day of beeswaxed (warm raw milk) cheddar and the subsequent Ricotta within the next couple of months. After you guys help me get this down, I'll be getting into trick cheeses that have blown up on me in the past!
Thanks to the Forum managers for keeping this great site up, and I look forward to being an active part of this group. I have an awful lot to learn, going to be lots of fun doing it.
