First Cheddar

[Sue~]

My first hard cheese, I can't believe it's actually tasty! I had numerous problems, aged in a fridge for three months and had mold under the wax (I didn't realize how hard it is to balance 50 lbs on a little block of cheese!  That's why it's not very square).  I ended up with about 17 ounces of cheese.  I will probably re-wax a bit of it and let it age some more.

Thanks for all the info here, it really helped.   The last picture show a bit of the mold that was under the wax.  The cheese turned out sort of 'crumbly' if that makes sense.  Not sure what the texture should be

[Gürkan Yeniçeri]

Hi Sue,

Why it is so white? Is that your camera?

Looks like you skipped the cheddaring step a bit fast.

To prevent mold growing under the wax, I wipe the cheese first with vinegar; let dry and dip into hot wax.

[Sue~]

I made a ton of mistakes, including things like the temperature was too warm and I think the rennet was old.  I have no idea what color it's supposed to be though.

I'm just happy it tasted like cheese! LOL

[smoky mountain girl]

Did you use goat milk?  Cows milk has beta carotene, which gives the yellow color and goat's milk does not therefore it makes a white cheese. At least that is what I recently read.

[Sue~]

I used cow's milk.  I plan on making another cheddar this weekend.  Hopefully it'll go better this time, I learned a ton and glad I took notes the first time around.

[MrsKK]

Unless I added annato, my cheddar turned out fairly white, too, especially when using anything other than summer milk.

It looks like you're getting there.  I personally never consistently made good cheddar, so kudos on sticking with it.