This weekend was my first attempt at making a Colby cheese. I will give my complete notes here as I used an amalgamation of recipes that I found in different places and would be eager to hear suggestions for improvement. Also, I will report on it when it is ready to be eaten!
First things first: I found a source of raw milk by collaborating with a local health food store owner. She arranged with a dairy farm she knows to get me some raw milk (which is not that easy to find in the Pittsburgh, PA region!). The dairy milked the cows on Thursday, I got the milk on Friday from the store, and made the cheese on Saturday (27 January 2012). Here is what I did:
0800 poured the two gallons of milk into a stainless steel pot. Temp of the milk coming out of the fridge was 42 degrees (From here on out, it's all in Farenheit - my apologies to those who are more comfortable in the Metric system). Turned on the heat under the milk to a simmer
0855 milk reached 86 degrees so I turned off the heat and sprinkled one quarter teaspoon of DVI MM100 on top. After a minute or two of it sitting there, I stirred the milk from top to bottom to help it distribute throughout the milk.
0930 Mixed one quarter teaspoon of Annato powder into one quarter cup of distilled water. I found this Annato powder in our local supermarket. I wanted to give the cheese an orange color to help distinguish it from the others that I have in the cheese "cave" and several suggestions on this forum implied that was an OK way to achieve it. We'll see.
0955 Mixed half a teaspoon vegetarian Rennet into one quarter cup of distilled water.
1000 The Annato powder is separating from the water, so I gave it a vigorous stir and poured the slurry into the milk. Saw no change in the color of the milk. Mixed the Rennet into the milk as well. At this stage the milk temp was 83 degrees. Covered the mix and let it sit.
1045 Saw a clean break. I can see little orange specks or dots in the curds which I am assuming came from the Annato. To my disappointement, the color of the overall curds is still very white. I am wondering if I used too little Annato powder? Anyway, I cut the curds into about half inch cubes and let it rest.
1055 The curd mix is at 78 degrees and the curds have all sunk below the surface. Turned on the heat at Low.
1120 Mix temp is at 101 degrees. Curds are definitely shrinking a lot and dropping to the bottom where they are matting together. The Whey color is almost brownish but the curds are white. I am stirring the curds and breaking up the bigger clumps.
1150 After stirring for the past 30 minutes, I drained a little over a gallon of whey to expose the curds. At this point I started adding cold tap water back in, stirred, and monitored the temperature of the mix. It took about 96 Oz of water before the temperature reached 82 degrees. So, at this point I let it sit quietly for 15 minutes.
1205 Drained all the curds into a collander that was lined with Butter Muslin and let it sit for 20 minutes over the sink to drain out.
1235 Moving to the pressing stage, I transferred the curds to my 7.5 inch Tomme mold that was lined with Muslin. While engaged in this, I also stirred in to it One Tablespoon of Kosher Salt (This step seems strange to me, but three of the five recipes I was looking at called for it). Once the curds were in the molds and the Muslin pulled tight, I pressed the cheese at 20 lbs for 30 minutes.
1315 Flipped the cheese over and returned to the mold in the Muslin. Pressed the other side at 30 Lb.
1350 Flipped again and redressed. This time increased the press to 40 Lbs.
1500 Flipped again and redressed. Thsi time increased the press to 50 Lbs. At the beginning of each of these pressings, whey comes out quite quickly but slows down quite a bit within a few minutes.
29 January 2012 - At 0900 took the cheese out of the press and placed it in a medium brine. Since the cheese floated on the brine, I salted the top surface of it lightly and put it covered in the fridge.
1900 - Removed the cheese from the brine and am letting it sit in room temperature to dry. The attached picture was taken at this stage. As you can see (I hope), the cheese is slightly orange in coloration.
I intend to leave it in the room temp air for a day or two until it feels dry to the touch and will then vacuum seal it and put it in my cheese cave for 60 days.
Any suggestions for improvements? Comments? Feedback?
Thanks,
