Based off of the recipe at cheesemaking.com/brick.html. Since I was out of MM100 I used Meso III instead - has Lactococcus lactis ssp. lactis and Lactococcus lactis ssp. cremoris but no ssp. diacetylactis. I also left out B. linens culture. Almost all of the cheeses we made so far had some B. linens show up early, welcome or not. I wanted to rely on that local linens for this.
2 gal. First Street milk
1/4 tsp Meso III
1/2 tsp rennet
1/2 tsp CC
1. Milk to 88 F
2. Add 1/4 tsp Meso III
3. Ripen for 10 minutes
4. Add 1/2 tsp CC, 1/2 tsp rennet
5. Rest for 30 minutes
6. Cut into 3/4 in. squares, then into 3/8 in. cubes
7. Rest for 5 minutes
8. Stir gently for 10 minutes
9. Raise to 100 F over 45 minutes, stirring slowly
10. Remove 2 qt whey
11. Add 65 F water until the temperature of the curds is 85 F
12. Let the curds settle and remove whey
13. Drain in mold for 15 minutes
14. Press at 2# for 3 hours, turning regularly
15. Leave in mold overnight with no weight
16. Brine for 5 hours
I washed and flipped every day for the first ten days. As per Alp's guidelines, I kept the same brine for the whole time. At first I washed with a cloth. Some pink flecks of B. linens showed up all over within three days. The cheese started to smell yeasty, and then grew more earthy after a few days. At the end of a week the cheese hardly had any color or smear. I could tell the cloth wasn't cutting it. I then started smearing with a brush, and that did the trick.
These pictures are from day 13 or so. I had stopped washing it the last few days before I wrapped it and put it in the fridge. Oh, and the smell had gone from earthy to devilish.
Been in the fridge for two weeks. I plan on opening it around Christmas. Different recipes call for anywhere fro 3 weeks to 3 months of cold storage. Any experiences with aging time?
I unwrapped the cheese on Christmas eve, at about seven weeks of age. It had a good stink, though nothing as strong as Limburgers I had before. Large patches of the cheese had some blackish mold over the smear. The mold grew happily on the waxpaper, so I don't know how much actually grew on the cheese itself.
Pictures:
(https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?ui=2&ik=ee6306eddf&view=fimg&th=14abb7bc8f458acd&attid=0.1.2&disp=emb&attbid=ANGjdJ97LR8LD8truBDzwPMoww_YWy29XHGNywR8blTE_BPbBWvMIGWSj_TAwlVIGRaRGjVgkaTT079PnUsqsfdceTHrHU0lV76YCdkCyKNrCuAuhq5oq-1ve3EHoeg&sz=w1280-h960&ats=1420504101693&rm=14abb7bc8f458acd&zw&atsh=1)
(https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?ui=2&ik=ee6306eddf&view=fimg&th=14abb7bc8f458acd&attid=0.1.4&disp=emb&attbid=ANGjdJ908315UTiocGEG9Uj6FQjd800Xv8YcMMN2FZEQPYgcxTv-kJgj-BLi8F6qsm0TO3cW2FoigfO2nBuvVXIZebnmPX9Qjq-jSk0DbwQyH4CnTmsDul8KpXWGPwQ&sz=w1280-h960&ats=1420504101694&rm=14abb7bc8f458acd&zw&atsh=1)
The cheese was going soft around the edges under the rind, while the core was chalky-crumbly. The first taste was quite mushroomy, earthy, slightly bitter. At first I was disappointed. The brick tasted nothing like the Limburger I remember eating. My father, who is German, thought both the smell and taste were spot on.
I have had the cheese several times since on dark bread and love it. Not quite what I aimed for, and not a good cheese for eating plain, but a solid winner in the right combinations.
In the meantime I made a washed-rind cheese that developed an orangey-red rind quite quickly. That cheese had the classic (in my mind) touch that B. linens adds. My guess is that when I washed the Brick improperly early on I threw off the balance of the flora. Not enough B. linens, too much of something else. So I'll plan on making this cheese again sometime, smearing it with a brush from the get-go, and see what happens. And for now I'll enjoy this one with some more dark bread, or maybe potatoes.
One question. After ageing a cheese in foil in cold storage for a long time, should I air it out at all before eating? Should this make a difference in terms of ammonia or the flavor of the cheese?