First stilton

[Geodyne]

I made this last weekend, following Caldwell's recipe.

8 ltr pasteurised, unhomogenised milk
600 ml pasteurised cream
1/4 tsp MM101
2 drops PR18

Turned these into moulds and turned twice daily for 5 days. Smoothed on the 6th day which was a bit too late - I had to break a crust to do so, and there was already a fine white-blue dusting in some of the crevices. These are now in affinage in my 'cave', which consists of a plastic container in a cooler.

I really need to get a taller stilton mould. I don't have anything tall enough to allow the curds to press themselves. I gave these a very light, short press with the press and a 3 lb weight but was wary of taking the press too far.

[graysalchemy]

Nice looking cheese  :)

[shotski]

They look very nice Geodyne, good job.

[hoeklijn]

There are several posts on the forum about how to smoothen the outside of the cheese. That way the risk of getting unwanted molds in the deeper parts of the rind can be reduced. I saved about two handfull of curd in some whey in the fridge for that purpose. Warm them to about 36C and you have a perfect paste to achieve that...

[Geodyne]

Oh what a good idea. Thanks Herman, I'll do that next time. This time, I worked like I would with icing on a cake. Long flexible spatula warmed in boiling water. That worked a treat, with a bit of patience. I'll have to go and search for the other posts about smoothing I think.

Tia, GA, thanks. Hopefully they blue up nicely!

[shotski]

Down near the bottom of this link H-K-J did a video on smoothing blue cheese. I find this techneque works best for me.

https://cheeseforum.org/forum/index.php/topic,10944.0.html

[Geodyne]

I hadn't thought about smoothing by hand. Thanks Shotski - and H-J-K - for sharing.

One day after smoothing and there's a lot of light blue fuzz evident. I'm working on getting the RH up.

My poor 'cheese cave' is starting to look very full, particularly as there's a 3lb cheddar in the press queuing for space. I'd been hoping to avoid buying an electric fridge but I'm going to have to save up for a wine fridge, I think...

[Geodyne]

12 days and these are turning a lovely gold colour and blueing up nicely, especially in the crevices. I'm quite pleased with being able to maintain a constant 80% RH and 11-13C in a cooler with ice blocks.

[H-K-J]

here is my latest smoothing technique It is a little easyer to fill in the cracks and things ^-^

[Geodyne]

That's a great video H-J-K, thanks. I particularly like the moment when your wife nabs a cheese crumb for herself.  ;)

That's a similar method to the one I used, but I did leave the smoothing a day or two too late. The cracked curd you see on the top of the left-hand cheese is a slightly drier curd to the rest which didn't particularly want to have anything to do with the rest of the cheese. It's joining the crowd now, with the higher humidity.

[Geodyne]

A week in the cave and these are blueing up nicely. I'm surprised at the acceleration in the blueing over the past few days. I think I'll be brave and pierce these this weekend as I'll be away the weekend after that.

[fabian]

Very nice looking blue!

[Geodyne]

I've just come back from a week away in which these were completely neglected in their cooler. Fortunately the weather was cool while I was away so the average temperature (as near as I can tell) was 13.5C, or roughly 55F. They'd become quite fuzzy and had a faint ammonia smell so I decided to air them for an hour and brush them down lightly with a sterilised pastry brush. After airing and brushing they smell good, and a tiny bit of the rind accidentally bumped off with my thumbnail tasted delightfully of PR rather than anything nastier.

I'll pierce these tomorrow and tend them lovingly for 6 days, and then they'll be left to their own devices for a bit over two weeks while I swan off on holiday.

Pics are before and after brushing.

[Geodyne]

I pierced these today, vertically and horizontally, at roughly 3/4-inch intervals, and the paste tastes amazing. I'm really looking forward to trying these in a couple of month's time.

[graysalchemy]

I hope my one turns out as good as that,.  :D

A cheese for you.  :)