Going to make a Goats Milk Gouda Any Advice?

[Tomer1]

I would imagine there is a technique to retain that amount of moisture or at least some of it?

[JeffHamm]

Hi Tomer1,

Well, in my case the curd was very very soft, and more or less broke up while stirring.  As a result, when it came time to pour off the whey I had to just pour the whole pot through cheesecloth.  This left quite a soggy lot of curd to transfer into the mold.  Normally I can pour off the whey while the curd sits on the bottom of the pot, or I can hold the curd back with a spatula.  I think the moisture just got trapped in this large gelatenous mass, and combined with the light and short pressing schedule, it had to seep out over a longer period. 

With Ian's curd, however, I don't get the impression that he had the same soft curd issue that I did, so if his large result is due to fluid retention, then it must have occurred for a different, if not entirely unrelated, reason.  Of course, as he said, he may just have read the scale incorrectly too.  That seems to happen to me a lot when I stand on one!

- Jeff

[pliezar (Ian)]

My curd was soft and I did have to pour mine like Jeff did, and it was quite "soggy" when it went into the press.  The longer I stare at my notes on it, the more I think I did write the wrong number down in the first place. I am thinking it was more on the 2lb side not the 3lb side (kind of feel like an ass about this too).  I did loose quite lot of moisture during the drying stage though.  I was flipping 3 to 4 times a day because my board was really wet.  I was too excited to weigh it when cut it open.  This is something that I have rectified in makes after that.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Ian,

Hmmm, 3 lbs is not quite 1.5 kg, and I routinely get 1.5 kg of green cheese from 10 L of cow's milk.  After it's air dried, and sits in the cave for awhile, it usually drops (as much as 500 g).  I've had two cheeses produce over 1.7 kg after pressing, the above mentioned butterkase and also a manchego (which just bumped over 1.7).  The manchego lost over 300 g while air drying, and the butterkase started at 1836 and is now 1384, so it's lost 500 g since make day.  So, to me anyway, your yeild does not sound all that unreasonable.  Especially if you had a soggy curd to start. 

- Jeff