Press - Inexpensive Recommendations

[Savas]

Good day and thank you for reading my post.  I am working with my daughters on a quest to make a cheese a month.  So far we made mozzarella and it turned out perfectly - so well in fact, that we made four pounds of it.  We are moving onto hard cheeses in February and need a cheese press.  Based on my research, a simple spring press is the easiest to use.  Do you know of an inexpensive cheese press or an all-in-one kit I can purchase?  Or, is there a single source for all I need and a detailed parts list. 

Also, is there any harm in using PVC tubing (4 or 6 inch) as our cheese mold?

Thank you very much for your advice and guidance!

[linuxboy]

What kind of cheese do you want to make? You can make many hard cheeses without a press.

Also, spring presses, while popular, are not well suited for cheesemaking. If at all possible, look into a dutch press or off-the-wall type press.

I would personally not use PVC, but some people do.

[Cheese Head]

Savas, welcome, ditto what linuxboy says, if you search on word "screw" or "spring" you'll find several threads on those types of presses, the problem is you ahve to keep screwing down as whey is expelled to apply the same pressure, a pain to wake up several times in night. On using white drinking water grade PVC to make your own pressing hoop, there are also several theads one had a link to a website that said it was OK for home but not for commercial cheese making. I started off that way and made a base and a follower from an old food grade cutting board. But cheese is acidic, so probably not good long term.

Personally I'd spend money on a mold first, here's my stepladder press .

There is no single source parts list for all you need for making pressed type cheeses, all depends on what you want to make and volumes. Our listing of global supply stores is here.

[bobb]

I started New Year's Eve and have made 7 cheeses.  Great fun and only one failure so far.  I use those plastic CD containers with holes drilled witha dremel tool for molds.  A 50 count holds 2 pounds.  The pusher is a 29 oz of Sweet Potato Pie filling. Have 3 10# weight-lifting  disks and a 40# pail of Ice-melting salt and on occasion use a gallon of water. Use a 5 gallon pail to set this all in as needed, so the stack won't tip over.  Takes up a small area in the corner of the kitchen.

Hope the weather cooperates so I don't have to use the bucket of salt for it's intended purpose.

[Jessica_H]

I started New Year's Eve and have made 7 cheeses.

You sound like me!  I started the day after x-mas and I've made 8 but I think my latest Camembert is my first real failure.  My Colby probably won't be amazing either.

My press was similar...a plate or bowl with a 5-gallon bucket of water balanced on top.  I only spilled the whole bucket once all over the kitchen floor...and then again all over the dining room floor before my better half ran into the basement and came back up with this:



I love it!  I only got to use it on my last hard cheese but it was perfect!  It took about 20 min to knock together.

[linuxboy]

That press right there in Jessica's post will work better for you than any spring type press. If you have a bare wall somewhere in your house, really, all it takes is mounting a 2x4 plunger arm to it on a bolt that can pivot, and then attaching another small piece of 2x4 for the downward press. That makes an off-the-wall press, and it works extremely well. If you don't have time/tools/space to make one, then you can buy a dutch type press.

[Seattle Slim]

The first press I used is one I made from directions on the Fias Co. Farms website. It consists of two boards, with the top one drilled out so dowels will fit through it. It cost about $15 in materials and I made it in an hour.  Advantages: it does keep constant weight on the cheese. It is durable.  Disadvantages: There's a limit to how much weight you can easily balance on it. My limit is around 115 pounds. If you scaled it up it could probably handle 150-200 pounds.  The press worked fine with washed curd cheeses that don't need a lot of pressure.  Not so well with any cheddar type cheeses. Also you need to keep rebalancing the weights.
     Recently bought a Dutch press. Easier to use and you can press with heavier weight. A vast improvement.