Dulcelife’s Fast Double Gloucester with Adjunct Thermo **update - Scrumptious**

[iratherfly]

Oh isn't she cute! Your Capella too 
I can tell you... it wasn't a 4gph world flying around in these GA aircraft. Insurance, rental, fees galore, certifications, recurrent training, unattractive club, partnership and leaseback proposals + all the other nonsense have put me back in day one of flight school, when the instructor asked "who here can tell me what makes a plane fly?". The winning student is the one that answered "money!"  I wanted to transition to sports/lights, but living at the center of a class A and B airspace (I'm in Manhattan), I would have to drive 50 miles out before I get to an airport where this is legal. I used to fly in SoCal so the weather was predictable and sunny for year-round flying but in the NYC basin it is brutal and volitile; changes in an instant.  And so -I am groundlocked for the time being.    I do miss it terribly.

Looked at the wax on their catalog. Doesn't say what it's actually made of (Paraffin?) but they do mention that you need to apply it and let it dry and then use regular cheese wax on top of it. It's a layer between the rind and cheese wax I suppose. I stopped using all of these things in favor of vacuum sealing, though I must say that even that, I hardly do. I really love natural rustic rinds. I only use the wax in drunken cheeses.

Getting tons of raw milk tommorrow from Dutch Belted cows. I am thinking of making a lightly pressed Tomme, then milling it, salting the curd and re-press it, then age it naturally for 3-6 months. A Tomme-meets-Cantal approach. Use a bit of helveticus and shermanii and low salt to get Swiss/alpine kind of nutty-sweet flavor profiling. I think it will work out beautifully.

[linuxboy]

Irather, IIRC the re-milled tomme is an actual tomme style in SW France in the midi-pyrenees. Made pretty much as you describe. Rennet high, drain high, acidify to 6.0, mill, salt, re-press. My guess is that the basque and pyrenees tomme makers met the cantalers of the south-mid and make this variant.

[iratherfly]

Actually, now that you mentioned it. I think someone told me in the past that Ossau Iraty is made with milled, pre-pressed curd (but no stacked slabs like cheddar). I wish I had sheep's milk at a reasonable price!

A friend of mine (a cheesemonger) have challenged me to make something like Sardinian Pantallemo. Do you think this is the secret? Raw goat cheese I have.

[linuxboy]

mm, from what I recall about Pantaleo, it has very clean milk lines, bit of citrus and grass. Some reminders of garrotxa. I think it's pasteurized milk, though, so any NSLAB would be from ambient flora, and any other nuanced characteristics from the milk. In my last trip to Italy, I chatted with a farmer from Sardegna who brought over native breeds to Umbria, and those goats were something else... wild, almost. I bet their milk is high protein, high fat. Would be hard to find anything similar in our classic US breeds (Nubian, Alpine, Lamancha, Saanen).

IIRC, ossau iraty varies with the region, with the majority not milled, but some is. That whole basque area, it's an amazing study in diversity. There are some fairly universal practices, but each little pocket is different.

I think trying to copy cheeses exactly is a bit tough. We have such great milk and flora here, might be better to learn from the practices of the cheesemakers and create unique, local creations.

[Dulcelife]

iratherfly, actually class B,C and D are legal.  All that is needed is a proficiency endorsement from a CFI.  NYC however is a tough place to fly. I was born and raised in Brooklyn, graduate of Aviation High in L.I.C., but never could get enough coin to get my wings, so bucket listed and here we are.

You and Pav talking all this milled curd Cantal-like tomme styles prompted me to check the prevoisly unimpressive cantal I hid and WOW.  What a difference time makes.  If I didn't know better I'd think it was a different as yet untasted cheese. Sharp, earthy, tangy and crumbly.

Okay, okay, I got it now, age the things.

[Sailor Con Queso]

THAT's why you don't (can't) rush good cheese.

[Dulcelife]

Navegador with Cheese:  Well if this fast DG is considerably tasty at 30, at least I know it will be spectacular at 90 and beyond.

By the way, what are your thoughts on Flora Danica?  I think it was Francois that mentioned hating it as it develops a disagreeable taste with aging.  Do you have any experience or opinion on this.  The reason I ask is because I cut into the Leiden of 93 days and it has developed an after taste I can't quite place and the first thing that came to mind was that I had used Flora Danica on this make.  My only other suspicion is that it may be some sort of bitter oils leaching from the Caraway seed.

[linuxboy]

this fast DG is considerably tasty at 30, at least I know it will be spectacular at 90 and beyond.

All cheeses have an optimal maturity curve, looks like a bell curve. If you push the enzymes, it will ripen quickly, spend a little time at peak, and them begin to decline, to the point where a 6-month adjuncted cheeses will not be that great, but a 3-4 month will be. Important to taste and take notes, because these cheeses may be a little tricky.

[iratherfly]

Yes, aging does the trick.  I had a blue that I aged for 3 months and nearly tossed to the trash a couple of months ago. Decided to give it a try with breakfast today. Whoa. Everything that was missing is now there. I am glad I took the bet.

I didn't know you can do Class B with sports license. I thought you can't do heavily populated areas or mix traffic with airliners' approaches.  Still, you know this area... I am caught between 3 giant and busy Class A airspaces (JFK, EWR, LGA) + FAA special rule corridor over the Hudson.  Class B airspace here is so high when you are at the center of the cake, that if you take off from any of the nearby airport you would need to climb up like a rocket to get to class B over the city... I know someone who did commercial air taxi ops with a Cessna Caravan floatplane from the seaplane port in the East River. He would fly over the city wanting to go below airliner traffic as much as possible so he would tell ATC he was a helicopter. They would make nasty comments about "what type of helicopter takes off at a 270° turn over the water and crosses the city at 145kts, sir?" He would make up tail numbers. Today the system is a bit more sophisticated though...

[Dulcelife]

Yeppers,  I can't imagine any worst place for the private or occasional aviator than NYC or DC.  I have TPA nearby but stay under the cake if I'm headed to the west shore.  Anyplace else I generally stick to uncontrolled airports but occasionally talk to the tower in D or C to transition with or without flight following.

[Dulcelife]

this fast DG is considerably tasty at 30, at least I know it will be spectacular at 90 and beyond.

All cheeses have an optimal maturity curve, looks like a bell curve. If you push the enzymes, it will ripen quickly, spend a little time at peak, and them begin to decline, to the point where a 6-month adjuncted cheeses will not be that great, but a 3-4 month will be. Important to taste and take notes, because these cheeses may be a little tricky.

Pav, your write up on pushing fresh curd cheddar with adjuncts is what prompted this make to begin with.  And, what you describe: "the bell curve"  is what I was trying to push closer the the manufacture date:

Like I said previously:

"Not so much a rush, more like widening the "palatable" time closer to the make date: one to three months; but definitely usable at one!"

Of course that doesn't mean this make will live up to expectations or prove anything. I could have done a few things wrong in executing the idea and not know it.

I will follow your advise and taste and note, especially now that I have a trier I can use to sample smaller bits before committing to surgery.

[linuxboy]

Absolutely makes sense. My main point in the post is that these cheeses are often a bit tricksy. They'll be fantastic one week and you put them back and check in a month and it's like... what happened to my tasty cheese? This sometimes happens with normal culture cheeses, but in my experience, less so.

I love these adjuncted gems for the exact application you describe... I want a fast, tasty cheese, maybe for cooking or general nibbling, and don't want to wait the full term. They won't last to 6 months, anyway, so why not.

Hope I'm being a little more clear. Just wanted to share my personal experience. YMMV.

[Dulcelife]

Out-standing! Thank you for clarifying and giving me and my franken gloucester hope.

[Dulcelife]

This is absolutely awesome.  I know it goes against everything I've learned from the majority of experts with the exception of Linux (Pav), and DThelmers from whom I got the idea to experiment, but this particular experiment is a resounding success.

This cheese is a mere 13 days of age and my cutting into it came after much thought and consideration given all I've learned about the chemistry and microbiological processes involved in cheese making.  If nothing else, this proves -to me at least, that there are innumerable ways to achieve a good tasty product.

Maybe I got lucky.  Maybe there is something to really be learned about the potential of adjunct techniques.  What ever the case may be, I am very pleased beyond my wildest expectations.

My detailed make notes are posted so, I invite any doubters to give it a shot and lets compare results.

What I got is a very nice cheddar with all the characteristics of an 60-90 day or so aged cheddar.  The attack was right on.  Tang was there, buttery texture was evident with no crumbliness.  Rind was almost non-existent as expected for a vac-pack make and totally scrumptious.

I have a cream waxed wheel that will age to 60 days before tasting, but it will be a challenge to NOT consume the whole wheel and age 1/2 the vac-pack wheel a bit more to see how it develops.  Thankfully I was able to resist eating the other 1/2 wheel so I can nibble on it for the next couple of weeks.  Maybe.

[linuxboy]

Maybe I got lucky.

I believe this is known in the industry as mad skills. Kudos. Cheese to you