We have been making cheese about 8 months now, and have made 28 different types.... We were doing one a week until we got the cave pretty full, and started having more cheeses to try than we SHOULD be eating....
.... We are now doing a cheese every 2 weeks.... My wife and I eat one serving (1 oz.) of cheese each, per night, so that works out to about 1 lb. of cheese a week, total.... We do an 8-9 litre make, so the cheese runs about 2 lbs. (plus or minus), which is the other reason we are now doing a make only every 2 weeks.... When we get 3 or more maturing at the same time, we do a cheese plate as a lunch meal, with 3 or 4 types, an ounce each per type.... We currently have 24 different types in various stages of aging....
We try and make a mixture of varieties.... We are only interested in semi-soft to very hard types of pressed cheese (eg. Havarti to Parmesan), that we can wax or vacuum bag, because my wife doesn't want to chase mold.... so we only do types where we can avoid that.... Some of them age 1 to 4 months, some 2 to 8 months, some 3 to 12 months, and the longest (so far) are 6 mon. to 2 yrs.... So far the oldest cheeses we have tried were 6 months, but we will be tasting the last of our first cheese at 8 months shortly.... We divide up the maximum aging time into quarters, and consume 1/4 of the cheese each time (eg. at 2, 4, 6 and 8 months).... vacuum bagging the remainder to go back in the cave to continue aging.... So far we have been delighted by our success....
We originally started by just working through the varieties we really like, and then branched out into some we have never tried, but staying within the types mentioned.... Now that we have run out of room, planning what to do next is much more important, and I try and alternate short, medium and long aging cheeses in a 16 week cycle.... something like 4 mon, 8 mon, 4 mon, 12 mon, 4 mon, 8 mon, 4 mon, 24 mon.... That way we will always have something to sample, while other cheeses have a chance to age for the appropriately longer times they need.... We are currently redoing some of our favourites (some with added flavours), and alternating them with the few we haven't yet tried.... There are still about 10 cheeses that we have not yet done that we really want to try.... and believe it or not our "production schedule" now extends into next year....
We have had very good success, and only a few types were not the taste we like (although all were good), so if anything the problem is to fit the ones we really want to repeat into the list, while still getting to the remaining new ones....
.... Anyways, you asked.... and that's the way we are doing it....
Bob