Salt, Amount For Making Cheese (If Not Defined In Recipe)

[fooey]

So I guess my question now is, if these are your target salinities, how do you determine how much salt to add to the curds or brine or both such that you arrive at these percentages? There has to be some method that allows you to achieve desired salinity, right? Or is it just trial and error?

I doubt you test salinity with a salinity meter just before caving and say, "Too salty, into the garbage you go!" Likewise, could you increase salinity at this point even if you wanted to?

[tananaBrian]

If you want generalities:

chevre and similar fresh lactic or semi-lactic curd: 0.8-1.0
Bloomy rind types: 1.0-1.6%, depending on style
Milled curd types like cheddar: 1.8-2.2%
continental types: 1.6-2.0%
various cheese with eyes: 0.7-0.9%
pasta filata types: 1.2-2.0%, wide range here
Blues: 2.2-3.5%

2.5% for a fresh lactic cheese is about average, the salt helps to balance the acidity. A little high to my personal taste, I use less salt. I'll use about 2.5% for a higher fat lactic curd.

Here's an idea... Do a search across all forums using "LinuxBoy" (and Sailor Con Queso and others of course), put all that you find into a single document, and call THAT your book ...it's likely to be one of the best! 

Brian

[linuxboy]

Or is it just trial and error?

No, there is a way to model final salinity targets of hypothetical cheeses based on multivariable calculus. It would take me about 100 pages to explain how it's done. Basically, you make assumptions, start with known values like ones for cheese Aw, and then use probabilities to arrive at a final value.  We had a thread on this before.

In the real world, yes, it's usually trial and error. People usually make only a few cheese types, and it becomes a process... certain quantity of salt per batch, certain time in brine, etc. repeated over and over per recipe.

It's why we use the 3-4 hrs per lb guideline for most hard cheeses.

[iratherfly]

Taking a crack at simplifying this: When I said 2%-3% I meant this is the amount of salt you need to sprinkle or rub on a new cheese so that it would arrive in the salinity level that Linuxboy later described. Density and moisture content determine the effectiveness in which the salt travels in and out of the cheese during osmosis and how much of it gets absorbed in the cheese. Density and moisture in Camembert is obviously very different than density and moisture in Parmesan.   If you salt 1000g of each of these two cheeses with 30g of salt, they would not end up with the same salinity.

The 2.5% is just a rule of thumb. You obviously will have to experiment and see which works best for what cheese but it's a good starting point for any cheese you don't brine.  Not salty enough? - add another 0.5% next time. Too salty? Take 0.5% off. It will never be significantly different (i.e 1% or 6%) - It's just a good number that will give you something close to reasonable to begin taking measurements.  If you are salting multiple wheels for the first time then salt them in different levels and mark them so you know which is what level. Then taste and see which came out best and make it your regular amount for that cheese.