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CHEESE TYPE BOARDS (for Cheese Lovers and Cheese Makers) => FRESH LACTIC ACID COAGULATED - Normally Whey Removed => Topic started by: sandhollerfarm on September 03, 2014, 12:00:27 PM

Title: Making chevre - pH INCREASES when adding culture, finally decreases but fails
Post by: sandhollerfarm on September 03, 2014, 12:00:27 PM

I've switched to the recipe found here on the site (http://cheeseforum.org/articles/wiki-chevre-cheese-making-recipe/) for chevre as the texture is far superior to anything else I've made. BUT, it fails about 25% of the time. This is how it happens:

I heat the milk (raw goat milk, 4 gallons at a time) to 75F and measure the pH. The milk is almost always 6.1-6.3. I then add a generic mesophilic culture (the packets you can get from New England Cheese Making). The recipe says to wait for a 0.2 DROP. This does happen sometimes, other times is increases to something around 6.6 before dropping again. If the increase happens, by the time it drops to 0.2 less than the original number, I add the rennet. When it hits 4.6, it is loose shreds that cannot be strained.

Any ideas on why its increasing or how I should handle it?

(We are getting our raw milk license and I'd like to work up to getting our cheese license. But I need to get better at certain cheeses!)

Title: Re: Making chevre - pH INCREASES when adding culture, finally decreases but fails
Post by: Boofer on September 03, 2014, 01:07:18 PM

Marissa, how are are you testing pH? If it's with a meter, ensure the meter is clean with no milk stone, and calibrated. In the past I have had inexplicable rises in the pH while a make is in progress and they went away when I properly cleaned and calibrated my ExStik PH100 meter.

HTH.  :)

-Boofer-

Title: Re: Making chevre - pH INCREASES when adding culture, finally decreases but fails
Post by: sandhollerfarm on September 04, 2014, 01:07:30 PM

Thanks Boofer. I'm using the pH meter from New England cheesemaking:

http://www.cheesemaking.com/PH-Meter_2.html (http://www.cheesemaking.com/PH-Meter_2.html)

I cleaned per the directions and still saw a pH increase on the batch I did yesterday. I put the meter in a reference solution and it read correctly. Uhhh.....

By the way, I use the pH meter to make mozzarella all the time. It does the right thing and the cheese turns out fine. I'm so confused!

Thanks for the advice.