A lot of Swiss questions

[Red Dragon]

Ive been lurking long enough now as a new member and cheesemaker and have some questions that I need some help on.

I started by using Ricki Carroll's Gruyere recipe since I had major problems finding a Swiss recipe online that seemed trustworthy. http://www.cheesemaking.com/store/pg/24.html

I have made the initial cheese, and it is now in saturated brine for 2 days.
My real questions are about aging temperatures and rind maintenance.

Of course I have the standard refrigerator available, at about 40F
I have a wine refrigerator that I bought for cheesemaking that I keep at 60F (theres some Cheddars and a Blue in it now)
Room temp at home is 78F, but Ive noticed it getting down to 75F at night since the weather is cooling. (I live near Dallas, TX and the A/C is still on at this time of year)

I guess I could change the wine fridge temp, but it will affect the other cheeses. I could move those cheeses into the regular fridge and raise the wine fridge to its highest temperature, 66F.

I think I'll take Sailor con Queso's advice on vacuum bagging, but I really want to know:

What temperature should I do which stage of aging, based on my available gear?
Should I oil the rind at all? If so what frequency?

thanks!

[Red Dragon]

Well, I took the cheese out of the 48 hour brine bath this morning.
I put in on a bamboo mat in my 60F degree wine refrigerator to wait
for rind formation. It measures in height just under 4 cm thick right now.



Any advice? Its obviously a small one, made with just 1 gallon of milk.
This is my first cheese that will form bubbles, so any information would
be helpful- especially advice that will help me prevent explosions.

[Mondequay]

I just looked at the recipe. It calls for a 24 hour brine for 8 gallons. The usual brine time is 3-4 hours per gallon. Unless 48 hours was a typo, I think you are in for a very salty swiss.  Other than that, I have never made swiss so have no idea how to answer your questions, sorry.
Christine

[linuxboy]

Swiss should have a salt content somewhere around 1%. A 48 hour brine in saturated solution for a 4 cm high wheel will give you a salt content of ~4%, maybe more. You will have zero eye formation with that much salt. Also, 60F is on the cooler side for swiss, even with proper salting you would not get adequate eye formation. You need right around 66-70F.

Swiss is not oiled, no. You can try what you want, of course, I'm just talking about how it's made usually.

[Red Dragon]

Thanks, no I really did a 48 hour brining. I saw that in another recipe somewhere.
I used Ricki's gruyere recipe to get the ingredient measurements and cooking temperatures
right, but since I want a swiss, I didnt follow her recipe after the unmolding.

Im frustrated about this oversalting. I should have thought about it more, since the last brining
I had done was a cheddar the same size and it only brined for 3 hours. I think I found my problem:
The brining instructions I found were for a 90 pound round of swiss.

Oh well- Ill just keep the remaining procedure and see what happens.

[Red Dragon]

Swiss should have a salt content somewhere around 1%. A 48 hour brine in saturated solution for a 4 cm high wheel will give you a salt content of ~4%, maybe more. You will have zero eye formation with that much salt. Also, 60F is on the cooler side for swiss, even with proper salting you would not get adequate eye formation. You need right around 66-70F.

Swiss is not oiled, no. You can try what you want, of course, I'm just talking about how it's made usually.

I know that 60 degrees is too cold for eye formation. Thats why Im wondering if 75-78 is too warm since
thats the present temp at home right now, and the only environment I can age cheese in thats warmer
than my 60 degree wine fridge.

[linuxboy]

At that high of a temp, the cheese will most likely start leeching butterfat. By itself, 75-78 it's at the extreme high end for an emmethaler. I've only ever gone up to 72F. But thing is, you won't get eye formation anyway because of the salt, and the propionic you put in will just die off over the next 2-4 days. So I'm wondering what your goal is with the warm room aging.

[FRANCOIS]

Cheese uptake of salt in brine is dictated by fat content.  I doubt your swiss has taken in more than 2% salt, even with a long brine.   I have left cheese in brine for days (by accident) and found this first hand, high fat cheeses can suck in much more salt than low fats.  I have no idea what the chemistry is behind this, but we have even done chemistry testing on over rbined cheese and found this result confirmed.

If you leave a high fat cheese in brine too long you can get some salt out by soaking on cold water that is pH (4. and CaCl adjusted.

The warm room aging is for eye formaiton and is only a short duration.  You should get your cheese clean, dry and cold first.  Age it at 55 for a few weeks until you can roll a coat of PVA on it, this will help protect the rind when it's in the hot room.  I run my hot room at 77F.  Wheels sit there for two weeks while eyes form.   Then it's back to a chiller at 40F where it is stored until cutting.

[linuxboy]

Great points, Francois. I based my 4% and fat leeching estimates on the following assumptions:

1) He was using full fat milk, per the link to Ricky Carrol's site and recipe for gruyere. This is not standard PF ratio for emmenthaler.
2) Using saturated brine
3) Using an average moisture content for the style
4) Using a 48-hour soak and standard surface-volume ratio for gruyere.

For anyone who is interested, here's the more geeky side of salt uptake and how it happens. The way it works is that the Na+ and Cl- ions diffuse into the cheese. They diffuse by the water in the cheese coming through the cheese matrix and the brine coming in. It's more complex than that, but that's the basic principle. Now, there are a lot of factors that influence the rate of that diffusion, the specificity of salt gradients, etc. These factors include shape (surface/volume ratio), moisture (usually #1 factor), protein, and fat. The protein and fat are important because they form aggregates (along with bound water). Think of them like huge boulders in the stream of flowing ions and water. The ions need to go around the boulders, so they have a longer distance to travel. So it takes more time if there are many impediments. The other aspect about it is the "size of the pipes", because that determines the possible throughput. For you EE people, it's kind of like voltage and amperage. The aggregates of fat and protein organize in various ways. Generally, the more fat, the larger the space between these aggregates. Meaning the "pipe" is larger. So if you have two identical cheeses with the same moisture content but different fat contents, the cheese with more fat will have larger pores in the curd matrix. So even though there are more "boulders" and the ions have a longer distance to travel, the pipe is so much bigger that it more than compensates for the added distance.

There are other factors, like the achieving of equilibrium (depends on moisture level), pH and temp of brine, the effect of brine concentration on the gradient, etc. So I still think because it was a full fat milk (sorry if I misread), the salt is getting up there close to 4%.

Great suggestion on getting the salt out, I didn't think of that. From my notes on classic emmenthaler for aging, it is 2 weeks at 12C, paint, then 3-5 weeks at 20-24C, then move to cave at 8-10C. Salt content target is 0.8-1.2%

[FRANCOIS]

I agree with all of that, but I would point out one thing.  If the milk is homogonized you will get far less fat captured in the final milk.  For swiss and most yellows we run homogonized, but for high fats I get non-homogonized milk.  With a PF of 0.6 and non-hom milk I can get ridiculous fat capture in the curd.  Traditional swiss would use raw milk, and therefore grab more fat but it's still only 1.1 or so.  I have only experienced over brine issues with 0.7 or less ratios.  These are double and triple cream cheeses.   Either way, there's nothing to lose by trying to continue the process and see what happens, should be learning experience for Red Dragon.

[Red Dragon]

I used non-homogenized, whole milk for this. If anything It will be a learning experience. I may have some time this weekend, so I think I might make another one with just a 3 hour brine.

[smilingcalico]

I realize this is an old post, but just wanted to ask Francois what the humidity is in the hot room you spoke of?  Hope you read this, Francois!

[FRANCOIS]

Humidity is not controlled in the hot room.  I would guess it to be in the 50-60 range because air communication is with high humidity areas.

[smilingcalico]

So I've been reading a bit and seems like my 70F house at 65-70 humidity might be ok to age gruyere in.  Seems some recommend this only for a short duration and others suggest this may be ok for the long haul.  As I am only producing small wheels (2 pounds) I believe these will dry out in no time at this temp and humidity. Would anyone care to comment on this?  Am I better off going straight to cave conditions?

[FRANCOIS]

Those are not accetable conditions for gruyere.  Put it straight in a cave.  Elevated temperatures are only for eye formation.