Mother's Day Romano

[Flound]

Romano 2

10/05/2015

16L Farmers whole milk
7 cubes Biena Thermo B
3/8 tsp calf lipase
3.7ml CaCl
3.6ml calf rennet

Placed 7.4C cold milk in 35.0C sink bath to warm to 32.0C at 13:30

14:10 24.0C transferred to steam pan on griddle
14:15 24.0C added starter culture and lipase, griddle set to 2.5 setting
14:30 25.8C stirred through
14:33 griddle set to 1.0
14:35 26.5C
14:45 27.7C
15:01 29.5C
15:11 30.0C
15:24 30.7C
15:33 31.2C CaCl solution added and stirred
15:38 31.3C rennet solution added and stirred, floc timer started
15:52 31.1C 13:40 floc time - cut curd at 16:13
16:13 31.1C started cutting curd
16:19 31.1C finished curd cut with whisk let curd rest for 10 min
16:30 30.9C stirred
16:35 30.7C started warming to 46C over 45 min target time 17:20
16:39 31.5C
16:45 32.4C
16:48 33.2C
16:56 35.0C
17:02 36.3C
17:08 37.8C
17:14 39.2C
17:26 41.9C hmmm, need to tweak this process.
17:33 42.5C
17:35 42.7C
17:42 43.1C
17:47 43.5C
17:50 44.4C maintain for 30 min
18:00 45.0C
18:15 44.3C
18:20 44.1C whey off,
18:36 in press under 10lbs, synthetic bag
19:06 out of press, redressed in cheesecloth

[Flound]

335g of ricotta. Salted with 4g. Yum.

21:10 Flipped, put in mold without cloth, pressing under 35Kg

[shaneb]

It looks great Flound. Have a cheese from me.

Shane

[Kern]

AC4U, my friend.  It looks good.   

[Flound]

Thanks, folks.

Flipped it this morning, in the press again for its last few hours before brining.

[Flound]

Done pressing, and just before its salty bath.

1835g of Romanoesque goodness.

Last make I brined (saturated) for 12 hours at 1100g. Thinking I should go deeper here, perhaps 16-18. Any thoughts?

[Kern]

Flound,  If the aspect ratio is the same (D/H) then brining for about 50% more time makes sense to me.  If the two cheeses are the same thickness then I'd probably only increase the brine time by an hour or so to account for the difference in mass.  I, however, speak with no authority whatsoever as I have never made this cheese.  My answer is a WAGNER - Wild Ass Guess Not Easily Refuted.   

Kern

[Flound]

Diameter is identical to previous Romano, but the height, not the same. In fact, the height is about 50% greater.

I think I'm going to go 16 hours. Ride of the Valkyries!

[Flound]

Something about mice, men and plans.

Hour sixteen would have occurred around 9am my time, about two hours or so into my work day. However, I have very flexible hours and about a 10 minute drive, so I'm able to duck out if need be.

It was 1pm before it dawned on me what the source of my nagging sense of forgetfulness was.

Yup, 20 hours of brinage. (Sigh)

My thought is that the brine to cheese ratio wasn't ridiculously skewed (3.5L to 1.835kg) so the absorption rate will have slowed sufficiently. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Weight out of the brine - 1,823g.