The bane of (most) home cheesemaker is humidity control - especially in a converted fridge to cheese cave set up. I have a garage fridge with a Johnson temp control unit that does wonders keeping the temp in the sweet spot for cheeses, but as has been discussed here at length before, the humidity is an issue. I've tried pans of water, salt solutions, and wet paper towels that are hanging off the door shelves - i can get to 75% RH with these methods but getting to 80-85%RH is very hard and nearly impossible to maintain.
I've been bandaging (lard and cheesecloth) many of my cheeses as a layer of protection against extreme drops in RH (but also love the concept of bandaged cheeses) and have vac bagged some of my other cheeses - but I want to do a few natural rind cheeses (like a parm) in the future.
Enter ink bird. Decided to buy the IHC-200 (non wi fi version) as well as a 1 gallon humidifier (
https://www.target.com/p/crane-drop-ultrasonic-cool-mist-humidifier-1-gallon/-/A-15213805?preselect=11036853#lnk=sametab ). Works brilliantly. The gallon capacity is enough. inkbird controller is easy to install and use. For me, it has taken the worry about humidity out of the equation. As we head into cool fall and cold winter months, my fridge won't be kicking on and running as much and i think the inkbird will have to kick on less...
Downsides: the 1 gallon capacity humidifier takes up a large amount of space in my fridge. Willing to compromise that for now. I wonder how long the humidifier will keep working in that environment. I will update about mold growth as well (so far so good).
Once I figure out how to attach a pic, i'll take a pic of my set up (not letting me post a pic currently).
Trent
