I keep meaning to let these age, but they never seem to make past 6 months!
Traditional Cheddar #3
4 gallons raw Brown Swiss cow milk
½ tsp Kazu
24 drops Chymosin
2-½ tablespoons salt
Warmed milk to 88 degrees, added culture and let rehydrate 5 minutes.
Stirred in culture and let ripen for 40 minutes.
Added rennet and let sit for 45 minutes—should have taken 30 min. Increase rennet to 26-28 drops next make.
Cut curd into 3/8 inch cubes and let sit 5 minutes.
Increased temp to 102 degrees over 45 minutes—on target
Let sit at 102 degrees for 30-40 minutes--I let it sit 60 minutes until the pH was 6.3. Did the squeeze test and it seemed correct.
Drained at 6.3 then cheddared the curds (turning every 10 min) for 65 minutes until whey pH was 5.5.
Cut into ½ by 2 inch pieces, tossed with salt and hooped--pH after hooping 5.2
Pressed with 70 lbs for 1 hour, redressing once. Pressed with 204 lbs overnight.
Yield at unmolding 3 lb 10 oz—2 ounces higher than target weight
Hit all target temps and waited for the pH target to proceed thru steps. Took longer than recipe indicated, but given how fast the pH dropped during milling and salting I don’t think I want to increase the culture used. The yield suggests I was close to being on target for moisture.
All in All I think this was a good make--hope it melts!