CheeseForum.org ยป Forum
CHEESE TYPE BOARDS (for Cheese Lovers and Cheese Makers) => RENNET COAGULATED - Hard Cheddared (Normally Stacked & Milled) => Topic started by: the_stain on April 03, 2009, 05:22:03 PM
-
Yesterday I tried my first attempt at "squeaky cheese", or cheddar curds which you eat (or deep-fry, mmmmm) prior to the pressing process.
I used buttermilk as a starter which I believe to be the main source of difficulty I had with good, solid curd formation -- I don't think I let it acidify enough. Didn't get a very good clean break, and as a result the curds were too soft and didn't hold their shape and I ended up with cottage cheese after stirring/heating the curds.
Anyway, I'm going to keep experimenting, I ordered some "real" Meso-A culture, but in the meantime I was curious. When making the 30-minute mozzarella, you use citric acid to acidify the milk.... Since this is a fresh, non-aged cheese I guess this is acceptable because you won't need the cultures present for aging.
Since the same is true for 'squeaky cheese' do y'all think it would be acceptable to use citric acid (or lactic acid, which I also have access to) to acidify the milk prior to adding rennet, in an attempt to speed up the process and get a better clean break, thus ensuring better, more "rubbery" curds (which is crucial if you want to bread and deep-fry them.)?
Any thoughts on that?
-
I think you just volunteered to be the guinea pig ;D
Take lots of pictures!
Oh, and there is a post around here somewhere on how to get a better culture from buttermilk, I'll see if I can find it and PM it to ya.
-
I think you are right.... I will be trying this tonight, most likely. :D
-
Direct acidification will work, but you must have a ph meter on hand to properly time cutting, flocculation, and salting/milling. Direct acidification with mozz brings the pH down to 5.4 to 5.6 immediately. If you do the same with making squeaky cheese, you will get cut mozz curds. And if you don't get the right pH range when salting (5.2-5.35), the curds will not have the proper rubbery quality.
So it's away to save time, but you have less flexibility because acidification is so much faster. Also, the flavor will be different with direct acidification. A meso culture does much more in terms of flavor than break down lactose to form lactic acid.
-
I'm actually waiting on a new pH meter as my old Hanna-1 has apparently bit the dust after being stored dry for 2 years. :) In the meantime, I do have some pH strips with a 5.0-9.0 range - do you think those will get me "close enough" until I get my new meter?
-
Depends how good you are at reading the strip colors :)
If you're anxious to experiment, I'd try it with 1 gal and see the results. Try 1 tsp of citric acid (resulting pH should be 5.8 or so), then your usual starter culture and rennet schedule.
Keep in mind that one very critical point is the pH at time of salting, and it can be a bit tough to get the pH of solid curd with strips.
-
Thanks! Experimenting is fine with me, especially with milk on sale this week for 2 bucks a gallon! :D
I'm not looking for perfection, either - if I can get a fairly close approximation I'll be happy. The important thing to me is to get the texture firm enough, so even if I'm closer on the spectrum to mozzarella than cheddar, I'll be happy, at least in the interim! :)
-
If you have a cash and carry store (also called smart & final on the West coast) near you, their milk is about 1.60/gal. :)
Also, you could try a trick for pH measurement from the way the labs do cheese analysis. They take a sample, blend it with distilled water in a blender to liquefy everything and put the ions into solution, and then do either pH measurement with a meter, or measure total titratable acidity with a titrator.
-
I call halloumi "squeeky cheese" because once the cheese has been fried it squeeks. I wonder it what you are trying to make is similar to halloumi?
-
I'm not sure about the rest of the country but in Wiscosin Squeeky is just the mornings cheddar or Jack cheese curds not pressed. When you bite them they make a squeeky sound against your teeth.
Try the Montery Jack recipe in the recipe section. I one similar last night and it made some great Squeeky cheese curds. Just be careful not to squish them to much in the fridge or they mat together.
-
I'm not sure about the rest of the country but in Wiscosin Squeeky is just the mornings cheddar or Jack cheese curds not pressed. When you bite them they make a squeeky sound against your teeth.
That's exactly what I'm going for, but I can't seem to get the curds to remain in "chunks" the way I'm used to. It ends up falling apart when I drain the whey and turns into cottage cheese.
Thanks for the tip on the Jack recipe, I'll probably give that one a shot tonight or tomorrow! :)
-
UPS will be delivering my double-strength vegetable rennet and meso-a cultures this afternoon, so I'm going to give this another shot tonight I think. I just can't seem to get a firm enough curd using buttermilk/yogurt as cultures, and Junket Rennet tablets (which is all I can get locally.) I never quite get a clean break, and then as I stir and cook the curd it just falls apart and turns into something that looks like ricotta cheese. Hopefully the new ingredients will improve the process and get me on the right track.
-
I just drained my curds in a collander with cheese cloth I did squash them a little but they came out great. I think the MJ cheese made the best squeeky cheese so far - but then it was also my first raw milk.
-
Package was just dropped, so I'm going to give it a shot here shortly. If this doesn't work, it's gotta be the milk. I've been scratching my head today wondering why the "grocery store brand" of milk is $2.99 a gallon, but the "Generic" brand, which has the EXACT same label -- it really looks like they just took the logo off and put a new logo on, the rest of the label's layout, coloring, etc. is identical - is $1.99. I'm hoping it's not because I'm getting a lot more water in the cheap stuff! :D
-
can somebody please explain to me way the culture would be responsible for a bad curd set?
unless you over ripe it for 24 hours and it becomes thick like yogurt the I know it will not set correctly but other than that I don't see how it would affect it.
I wish I found milk that cheap here I only find it at around $4 dollars (another reason for me to use Dry&Cream)
-
I'm thinking under-acidification?
-
Yes, exactly. Rennet has a pH "sweet spot" of around 6.1-6.3 for when it works best. So if the starter is weak, it will be slow in reaching the pH level. Also, your later acidification of curd will be slower, making the curd susceptible to contamination.
-
Linuxboy, is that "sweet spot" just for Squeeky cheese? or all Meso-type cheeses?
Looking back at my notes, I am adding my rennet at pH 6.56-6.83. Perhaps too early?
Is this the wrong time to add rennet given that it is outside your sweet spot?
Can I ask where you got that range?
-
What I meant by the idea of a sweet spot is the time to flocculation (soft curd set) and firm set. At a pH of 6.6, it usually takes about 20-30 minutes to set the curd. With a pH of 6.2, it's more like 8-10 minutes. What typically happens with the right amount of starter is that the pH starts out around 6.5-6.7, you add rennet, and pH will of course decrease, which helps to firm up the curd.
With squeaky cheese meant for immediate consumption, you want a firm curd pretty quickly, meaning you should not let it sit for too long from the time of flocculation to the cutting time. If you add too little starter culture, the milk will acidify slowly, and you'll get a curd set, but it will take 15+ minutes to soft set, and much longer to firm set. And because it takes a while to firm set, you have to wait longer to cut, which results in a softer final curd mass more appropriate for blue cheese than a squeaky cheese.
In short, no, your rennet schedule at ~6.6 should be ok in combination with the rest of the steps. It is even fine for squeaky cheese with the right amount of starter culture. The key variables are time to flocculation, time from flocculation to cut, curd size, heat time, and pH levels at each stage.
clear as mud? :)
Paul Kindstedt in American farmstead cheese has a great discussion about flocculation. He explains it much better than I do.
http://www.google.com/search?q=flocculation+cheese (http://www.google.com/search?q=flocculation+cheese)
Google books has the section available. Look at pages 207-208. I got the idea of the range from seeing charts somewhere in a study that had time to curd set with various pH levels and amount of rennet. From what I recall, at 6.5 pH, it took 18 minutes to set, at 6.4 it took 14 and at 6.3, it took 8. So it's not a linear progression. I figured most people would want to see a firm curd quickly for making squeaky cheese, and then also cut pretty quickly, and decent acidification from a started helps with that.
-
Thanks for the insight. After reading this and checking out some additional resources I am pretty convinced that the difficulty I have had with this has to do with under-acidification, as it's taking me a good 45-60 minutes to get a good firm curd set (and as you described, the curds end up getting too soft and wet after cutting.) I also am going to experiment with increasing my rennet (I'm using 1/8tsp of vegetable rennet per 1 gal milk currently) and see if that helps get me a firmer set faster.