Cheese Curds for Packers Opener

[cheesehead94]

I'm a big Packers fan, so I wanted to make some Wisconsin style cheese curds for the season opener today. I also wanted to use this as a practice round for Caldwell's traditional cheddar recipe before I make my first cheddar wheel in a few weeks.

I just used a gallon of raw milk and tried to follow the recipe closely. I had a bit of trouble getting the temp up to 90 in the allotted ripening time, so the culture ripened for longer than usual, just in the 85 degree range for a while until it got to 90. At the end right before milling  and salting it said the PH should be about 5.3, but mine had already dropped to 5.2 in a little over half of the suggested cheddaring time.

When it was all said and done, they were pretty good! Squeaky and salty. My on two complaints are that they were a little bland (I suspect this might be because I milled the curd into fairly large pieces and the salt may not have permeated the pieces fully...when first biting into them they tasted good but then the flavor turned bland rather quickly in the aftertaste), and the texture was a little off. When biting into it the inside was a bit smooth and gummy instead of the "chicken breast" slightly stringy texture you want. Not quite sure what caused this.

Overall I am pretty happy with them though. Go packers!

[River Bottom Farm]

The quick pH drop and dropping too low is the cause of the texture being off. Flavor would be better if the pieces are smaller like you were thinking. Good first attempt though!

[cheesehead94]

Well hey, if I can't get it exactly right I'm glad that I'm at least starting to know what I'm doing wrong!

[mikekchar]

Wow.  Those look great!  As a Canadian who spent a lot of time in the Outaouais region (between Ottawa and Montreal), I think my blood is half cheese curds.  I must get some rennet :-)

[dickdeuel]

I found that vacuum packing and ageing will increase the flavor.  You might want to start with 10 days and go from there.

[feather]

Hey cheesehead, I'm one too. I leave my curds out overnight and they develop a bit more flavor.
I make mine with P&H store bought milk, but I'm sure that the raw milk you use will make the texture so much nicer.
Here's my recipe.
https://hilltophomestead.wordpress.com/2018/03/04/cheddar-cheese-curds/