A couple of hispanicos drying in the cave

[Danbo]

Just a quick picture of two hispanicos drying in the cave. They are 5 days old.

My plan is to try maintaining some sort of oiled rind... Any suggestions?

:-) Danbo

[Paine88]

Looking good! AC4U!

[AnnDee]

Beautiful cheese!
Whenever I oil, I do when the rind is already dry, after 2-3 weeks. I like olive and coconut oil, which oil are you using? Are you going to add paprika too?

[nccheesemike]

Beautiful cheeses!! I like the oiled rind idea. I just made an Alpine Cheese that's 4 days old. I'm going to give olive oil on the rind a try as well. Keep us updated

[Danbo]

I have always waxed or vacuum packed my cheeses. This will be my first try oiling cheeses.

I'm thinking... oiling the cheeses after two weeks... brushing off any mold and use vinegar and salt if the mold is aggressive... reoiling each 14 days. Is ordinary olive oil OK? I like the rind to be pretty clean...

At the moment I'm trying to age two goudas without wax or plastic. They are anout 3 weeks old. They quickly get mouldy/yeasty and I use a mix of salt and vinegar to keep it down.

I have read somewhere that washed curd cheeses like a gouda should be waxed and not have a natural rind because of the lack of acid helping to avoid mild and yeast... I have attached an image of one of the goudas - what do you think? Should I just proceed cleaning or perhaps wax?

[AnnDee]

Based on my experience, the rind becomes strong (dry and hard) after oiling. I was worried the first time I oiled my cheese but when I cracked it open several months later, the hard rind was thin and the paste was good and well protected. I use normal olive oil (not extra virgin) and coconut oil and I think somehow the oil wards off molds.

I made gouda with natural rind too and it was good. I didn't know if you are supposed to cover goudas but I had a nice tasting natural rind goudas, only problem was we ate it down too fast, there wasn't enough of it
If you don't like it to be too moldy (with blues or blacks), wash it with salted whey. It will leave you with dry white rind and no other mold come into play.
Maybe the microfloras in the whey acts as the dominant on the cheese, well that is what I read anyway.
What I do is I dry the cheese for 2-3 days then start washing every 2 days for 3-4 times. The rind will go a bit sticky first but then it dried up into smooth clean rind.

[Boofer]

Thanks for sharing your insights into rind development. Good stuff.

-Boofer-

[Al Lewis]

Beautiful cheeses!  I love my manchego mold.  A cheese for your excellent Hispanicos!!

[reg]

Thought I would post a photo of an Alpine style cheese with an olive oiled rind. As you can see the rind is not that thick and you don't loose to much of the cheese paste. In my opinion this is one of the best ways to finish the cheese of this style. The photo was taken in 2008

[reg]

And Danbo, those cheese look fantastic, love it !

[Danbo]

Thanks Reg.

Do you think that it is OK to start oiling after 1 week of drying in the cave? If so, I will start tomorrow. It seems like a bit of white mould is starting to form at the surface. Not quite sure if it's a bit of a candidum or geo... It is barely visible but I want the rind as clean as possible.

Your cheese look excatly as I wish mine to look like. Wow - what a finish!!

Danbo

[reg]

Danbo I would wait for four or five weeks for the cheese to dry before starting to oil. If you are getting white molds just wipe them down with wine or vinegar. Have you used the same cave for aging soft/surface ripened cheese ?

[Al Lewis]

I mixed olive oil and paprika and coated mine and when I went to check it one morning it was entirely covered in blue. LOL  Still tasted okay.

[Danbo]

Reg: Thanks for the advice. It's about 6 weeks since there was whitemolds in this cave. They were stored in their own containers and the cave has been cleaned with chlorine since. It's probably a cross contamination anyway...

Al: That's crazy...