Milk in Anchorage, Alaska

[tananaBrian]

Someone here once told me that there were plenty of cheese makers in the Anchorage, Alaska area and had (wink, wink) in the note ...but I'll be darned if I can find the post (or PM?).  If you are a cheese maker in the Anchorage area and are reading this, or are even the person who made the remark, could you elaborate?  Where and what kind of milk are you using?  Maybe it's technique or time or knowledge, but I haven't been able to get a good white curd with a nice clean break from local milks yet... except for Lucerne skim milk from Carrs... Do I need to resort to a cow share so I can start getting raw milk?

Thanks,
Brian

[Cheese Head]

Brian, there are some ideas on coagulation problems in the Wiki: Coagulation Defects article, I assume your store bought cow's milk is not Ultra-Pasteurized.

I only use store bought whole past & homogenize cow's milk here in Houston from a range of brands and never have a lactic or rennet coagulation problem.
 

[tananaBrian]

That's good to know.  Some of my issues might be nothing more than judgment of the curd, e.g. not meeting expectations may mean that I had the wrong expectations, and/or knowledge and experience.  Obviously if you can succeed with several different brands of P&H milks from Houston, which I'm certain is no different than Anchorage when it comes to milk, then I should be able to here as well...

Brian

[Cheese Head]

My brother lives in Queen Charlotte Islands, first Canadian ones S of Alaska and I'm not sure of the milk quality he gets as not much for grocery stores.

Even though your milk may say pasteurized it may be more so than down south here to get longer shelf life. Couple members here have had tough time getting rennet curd sets with organic P&H milk and when they phoned they've found out that it is basically ultra-pasteurized, also for longer shelf life.

Regardless, you are going to have to adjust your parameters to fit your milk.

Have fun!

[tananaBrian]

And even if you call, I think some of the manufacturers don't tell the whole story.  Example:  At one creamery here in AK, they told me that they pasteurize at 170 F ...but when pressed, they said 165 to "well over 185" degrees F and didn't say what "well over" meant.  I've only tried one gallon of their milk and it didn't form curds at all ...just a pot full of absolute mush that would drain right through a sieve.  I think I know what "well over" means.  It means "280 F for 1 second"...

We do have an outstanding dairy up here and I will gladly mention their name:  Northern Lights Dairy in Delta Junction, AK.  Too bad they don't distribute milk in the Anchorage area ...just in Delta and points north.  They aren't big enough to serve those markets AND ours.

So far, the most reliable milk that I've found has been Lucerne brand from Carrs/Safeway.  I'm hoping that with a little experimentation, that I can figure out how much extra CaCl and rennet needs to be used to make their performance more consistent.  Might be on to something here...

Brian