First Photos & Washed Curd Cheese

[Kern]

One of the tough things about being older is that you have to learn how to use devices (iPhone in my case) that ten years ago you never dreamed could exist.  But, about the time I started to make cheese earlier this year I also started to use my iPhone for something other than texting or making telephone calls.  I leaned how to not only take photos but to get them off the iPhone and use them for other purposes!  So, I made some hot water washed curd cheese last weekend largely following Caldwell's recipe for Hillis Peak cheese.  I won't bore you with the details as these are all in the book but I did learn a couple of things that really helped make this work well.

I guess the main transferable skill I learned is how to get the whey out of the vat sans curd in a fast efficient manner removing exactly what I wanted.  What I did was move the rectangular steam table vat (4-gallons) next to the sink while still connected to the heating griddle and temperature controller.  I wanted to remove one gallon of whey so I placed a gallon jug with funnel in the sink (once filled, a gallon was removed).  Then I put a kitchen sieve in the vat pushing the curds aside.  I used a glass measuring cup as a dipper and in no more than two minutes filled the gallon jug with curdless clear whey from the little pool created by the sieve.  Then I moved the pot with the 160F water into the sink and added the hot water back into the sieve with stirring my little pool.  This put the energy back into the vat to raise the temps from 89F to 101F without risking hitting the curds with very hot water.  With each cup added I raised the sieve and stirred the now warmer whey around in the vat and started the process again.  Over about ten minutes I had raised the vat temperature to 101 mostly without scalding any curds.

This would have been cool to photograph but I had no one else around to help so missed this moment.  At any rate here are some photos of the rest of the day:   

[Stinky]

It looks pretty!

[awakephd]

Nice technique, and a lovely result! AC4U. What mold are you using for this 4-gallon make?

[Al Lewis]

Looks like one of John's clear molds.

[Kern]

Nice technique, and a lovely result! AC4U. What mold are you using for this 4-gallon make?

Thanks for the cheese.  The mold is a six inch polycarbonate mold made by John at Perfect Cheese.

[LoftyNotions]

Congratulations on your new skills, Kern. Have another cheese.

Larry

[Kern]

LoftyNotions,

Thanks for the Cheese. 

Kern

[John@PC]

Nice work (again) Kern and I'd give you a cheese but that may reflect a conflict of interest .   What I will do is provide this link to remind the members of your efforts to encourage artisan cheese makers in your area in WA. 

[Spoons]

Nice job on shaping the cheese sides! It has an awesome finish!

AC4U Kern

[awakephd]

Ah, I see -- I didn't look closely enough to realize that the white color I was seeing in the picture  was the cheese or cloth, rather than the mold itself. If I had realized it was clear, I would have suspected John's mold.

[qdog1955]

Nice job Kern----AC4U
Qdog

[John@PC]

Kern, somehow I missed how you ended up with that nice shape.  Do you do the final bare press to get the bulge right after de-molding and just use pressure as needed to get the look you want?

[Kern]

I checked the pH and found I was getting close to the goal right before I was going to do a bare press.  The rind was closed and looking acceptably smooth so I decided to skip the last press in the PC cylinder and go for the "shaping press".  This was both simple and tricky.  Simple because all I had to do was put a cutting board on top with a little weight on it.  Tricky because the cheese wanted to become lopsided.  So I flipped the cheese, put replaced the cutting board along with the weight and started measuring the distance from each of the four corners of the cutting board down to the counter top.  The goal was to keep moving the weight around keeping all four measurements the same.  I did this for about 45 minutes flipping and rotating the cheese about every ten minutes to keep the curve symmetrical.  After this I was at the goal pH and put the cheese in the brine turning it about every 15 minutes until it firmed up (about an hour).   

[awakephd]

Clever idea to get that nice rounded shape. I'll have to try that!

[Kern]

Try it on the cheddar you are making this weekend.