Hello from Alabama

[timnbama]

Hi, my name is Tim and I'm in west central AL. The main cheese type that I've ever made is gouda even though I've tried a few others ever now & then. Most "American" style cheeses make me want to run hide as I could never stand that crap even as a child. Hopefully this weekend I'll manage to get a new cheese press built. This one will be a sturdy affair using barbell weights as the press weights. I'm tired of those wobbly things that make the cheese eneven or it requires an engineering degree to get it set up for a level press or ever couple hours you're having to reset the press by applying so many more turns or you're just not sure how much pressure it is applying. I'll even try to post a few pics of the assembly process as I build it.

[DeejayDebi]

Hello Tim welcome to the forum.

[Cheese Head]

Howdy Tim and welcome to this forum! I think you are the second in Alabama, first is a big time beer and mead maker!

Congrats on the Gouda's, lots of cheese press posts in that board!

[timnbama]

I don't make beer but I do enjoy making wine and mead. I have made wine for about 25 years now. There's nothing like a good glass of muscadine wine with a little cheese.

[wharris]

Cannot agree more.

There are few things more satisfying than an evening with one's own wine, and one's own cheese.

You brought up wine,  do you ferment your muscadine grapes to dryness?  or do you make a sweet wine?  I ferment some local Chancellor varietals to dryness.  (med. body, slightly tepid, good 3rd bottle wine.....)

[timnbama]

I prefer dry to extra dry in just about all of my wines. I gave a friend of mine a glassful of 2 yr. old muscadine this afternoon and he was amazed that it was dry as he had only had some concoction like most people make with muscadines, sweet enough to give a diabetic aftershock! A good glass of red wine ever so often can only help to clean out your system from cheese fat. And then you need a bit of cheese to get the wine taste and smell off your breath, it could go on like that for a while if a guy wasn't careful, lol.

[Cartierusm]

Mmmmm, wine. Welcome. I've got a 1991 Ch. St. Jean Muscat Canelli that got lost in the back of the cellar, I'll crack it open one of these days, hopefully it'll still be good.