First cheddar soon and I want to make sure I have the plan down

[avaserfi]

I'm going to try my first hard cheese soon, a farmhouse cheddar, and want to make sure my plan will work. I've read so many different recipes that I am slightly lost. Does the following sound like a good plan? All ingredients, but the milk came with the Hard Cheese Kit from cheesemaking.com (just gifted to me). I am using raw cows milk.

2 gallons milk
1 packet mesophillic starter
1/2 rennet tablet dissolved
1T salt

Heat milk to 90 degrees F, add culture and stir. Maintain temp for 45 minutes.
Add rennet, stir gently, cover and let sit for 45 minutes.
Cut curd into 1/2" blocks.
Bring mixture up to 100 degrees, slowly. Stir gently every so often to prevent curds from sticking.
Let sit for 5 minutes then drain for 1 hour.
Break the pieces up and stir in salt. Put in a cheesecloth lined press
Press with 10lbs for 15 minutes.
20 lbs for 12 hours then turn and do another 12 hours.
Remove cheese cloth and air dry at room temperature until dry to the touch 3-5ish days, turning often.
Vacuum seal the cheese and age.

It is pretty warm here 75ish degrees. Will that matter for the room temperature drying phase? Also, I will have to age the cheese sealed at 45ish degrees. Is that going to be a problem (besides the slower aging)? How do you know when the cheese is ready?

[mtncheesemaker]

I don't make cheddar so I can't help you with the recipe.
I do believe that you should naturally age the cheese for several weeks before vac sealing it.
Cheddar can be aged for a long time; you can eat it from 6 months on, if you can wait that long. The longer aging the better, all things being equal.
IMHO, you just have to try a recipe, then you can tweak it as you gain some experience.
Good luck.
Pam

[JeffHamm]

Hi avaserfi,

Personally, I would suggest trying a caerphilly as your first hard cheese.  It involves stacking and milling, both of which are part of making cheddar, so you'll get to practice the procedures.  However, caerphilly makes for a decent tasting cheese in 3-4 weeks (improves up to 3 months, but it's quite good young).  Because of the quick turn around, you can experiment a bit to see what's working while still developing the skills that are used for cheddar.  Also, the make time for caerphilly is only about 4 hours.  Mind you, I've not made a true cheddar, so perhaps it's no more difficult?

- Jeff

[avaserfi]

Jeff,

Do you mind sharing your recipe for caerphilly? The shorter aging time would be nice for starting out.

Thanks

[JeffHamm]

Hi avaserfi,

here are my make notes from the first one I made.  The 2nd time, I used a bit less rennet, got a floc time of 14 minutes, and used a 3x floc multiplier.  That cheese has turned out really good.  Anyway, I also brined this one, but that made it too salty (the 2 tbls of salt added in is enough) so I removed that detail from the notes.

There's a few of us who all made Caerphilly recently (in the "hard other" board), and it's turned out well for all of us.  Darius is experimenting with adding herbs to it as well, so lots of varieties going on.  Check out those threads and you should get more than enough tips to get a good cheese in fairly quick time. 

And, once you're happy with it, I would suggest aging one for a few months as I'm pretty sure it only gets better as it ages.

- Jeff

Caerphilly:

Ambient Temp : 26 C, Barmoeter: High Pressure; overcast
10 L Silver Top (Meadow Fresh full cream milk; pasturised)
Warm to 32 C: (time 2:39)
Add ¼ tsp CaCl (50% solution)
Add 1 melted ice cue mesophillic starter (Flora danica)
Stir 1 minute.
Cover and Wait 30 minutes: time at start of wait __2:40____ at end __3:10_____
Add 0.8 ml Rennet  (temp 31.5; put in sink with warm water @ 33-34)
Wait 40 minutes: time at start of wait: __3:11____ at end __3:51___
Cut into 6mm cubes : time done___3:59______ (clean break temp 31.70C; might be a bit milky?)
Raise temp to 33 C over 10 minutes. (act temp at end of raising _33 in places, warmer/cooler in others_)
Wait, stirring occasionally to prevent matting 40 minutes: time at start___4:11______ at end _4:54__ (temp at end 33.1 – 33.3)
Rest 5 minutes
Drain curds through cheesecloth lined strainer.
Cut into 1 inch wide strips and stack, rearrange in cheese cloth (to aid whey off)
Flip twice over 10 minutes.
Break into thumbnail size pieces (time at start of milling: _5:30 (had supper_)
Pressed at 5 kg 20 minutes (cleaning up) (6:00-6:20)
Removed from press, rubbed some salt all over, and pressed at 5 kg 10 minute (6:20 – 6:30)
Removed from press, rubbed some salt top and bottom, and pressed at 7.5 kg 20 minutes. 6:30-6:50
Removed from press, rubbed some salt top and bottom, and pressed at 7:5 kg over night.  7:00-11:00
Weighed cheese at 1532g (17-18 cm diam 6-7 cm height, which works out again to approx 1cm3/g)
Air dry __3__ days, then moved to cheese cave