Hello.
I was wondering recently, could you use the rind of some brie/camembert to "cultivate" Penicillium Candidum? I doubt that you could achieve good results, but it doesn't hurt to ask.
I have some cheese from my recent trip to France (it's so good, I'm afraid to eat it all!). I have put some "samples" in the freezer, in the case it's possible to revive and use some rind.
If we ignore the contamination risks, is the PC alive on frozen cheese? I wouldn't even think about that, but the PC is quite unavailable for me (the shipping cost is very high and it's not a cheap mold for an amateur cheese lover like me). Is there a small chance to succeed in such a task?
Thank you!
Alex.
Yes you can. But it is probably safer to spray the outside of the cheese with a morge of the rind. That way if there is something unwanted it would appear on the surface where it is more easily dealt with. I have been using such a morge with my camemberts, I have a PC niege culture but didn't have a geo culture so I used a bit of rind pulverised with fork in 1 cup of water with 1/4 tsp each salt and sugar (non-iodized salt of course). I let this "incubate on the counter in a spray bottle for several hours and then left in the refigerator for at least 16 hours before use. I sprayed this onto my unmolded cheeses and the geo was evident within 2 days (I leave my cams in the room temp box for a day or two before sending to the cave). Note I also got some linens but I had linens appear even when I didn't use the morge and it was only ever overpowering on 1 cheese from 1 batch, so far. Not sure how the freezing will affect things but I think it would work. Yoev (iratherfly) posted about this procedure somewhere, and he has directions for morge on his mixed culture descriptions at artisangeek.com. Good Luck!
John
The short answer is yes. I do it a bit differently from John. Basically, I cut a triangular wedge, about bite sized, and remove the rind with a knife (sterilized in boiling water first). Put the rind in distilled water and mash it about with a fork (also sterlized). The water will go cloudy. Remove any chunky bits. Then, I pour this directly into the milk when I'm starting to warm it up. I do the rind prep not long before pouring it in. I've always has the mould sprout, and have gotten pretty good results (my last attempt wasn't great as the curds were too dry and formed a rind, but that wasn't the mould's fault). I find it best to sterilize the ripening container extra carefully because these types of cheeses are ideal for growing mould, and blue mould (at least the wild stuff I have here) will hold its own.
Anyway, spraying the mould spores on as John suggests is also a completely viable way of doing it. Lots of options. Try both and see what works for you.
Wow, thanks John and Jeff. Very comprehensive explanations.
I have one more point to clarify, if I'm not asking too much. Is the spray method enough for the flavor development? I can't imagine how the PC would get inside the cheese.
Can't wait to try both methods, I'll speak in French with the mold, maybe it will be more cooperative :D
Also thanks for the reference, I'll check it out.
Alex.
OK moule faire votre truc. Je compte sur vous. ;)
OMG, it started to grow!!! Yesterday I turned the cheese and examined it, on the surface there's white fluffy mold!!! It is barely visible, but it's growing! I hope to post a success story in 2-3 weeks. Thanks guys, you are awesome!
Alex.
Excellent Alex!
It is exciting to see it grow. It is a good idea to pat the grown down each day. First, you'll get spores on your hands and spread them around, and second, it keeps the rind from getting too thick.
And, the spores need air to grow, so the mould spores inside the cheese don't grow and flavour the cheese at all (unless there are pockets inside, then you get rind there too). What happens is the mould on the rind processes the sugars and breaks down the cheese into a softer gooey glory, and the enzymes and such that the rind produces will work their way into the centre of the cheese, until it is ripened all the way through. So, in short, both methods can produce very good results. It's about finding the one that works best given your milk and cave situation.
Oh, and photos of your new mould are a must! :)
Quote from: JeffHamm on July 23, 2015, 08:41:18 PM
What happens is the mould on the rind processes the sugars and breaks down the cheese into a softer gooey glory, and the enzymes and such that the rind produces will work their way into the centre of the cheese, until it is ripened all the way through. So, in short, both methods can produce very good results. It's about finding the one that works best given your milk and cave situation.
Nice description, Jeff.
Very similar to washed rind ripening also. :P
-Boofer-
Yes, the bacteria (b.linens) ripens by similar processes, in the sense of it being outside to in. So you can add b.linens to the milk, but only the stuff that grows on the rind does the work.
This is why, for those new to rind ripened cheeses, you have to pay close attention to the thickness of the cheese. The ripening will proceed so far, and I suppose it could eventually work its way to the middle of a very thick cheese but by the time it does the outer edge will have over ripened and gone off. Someone described it as putting frozen chicken pieces in a deep fryer. Although the outside might get cooked, the inside will be raw - and when the inside finally gets cooked, the outside is burnt.
My current Port Salut is a prime example of forgetting to consider the form factor. It's too thick, so probably won't ripen quite as nicely as I would like, and it explains why Port Salut is traditionally made with the same amount of milk, but in a mould that is wider and produces a thinner cheese (more disk than barrel).
Quote from: JeffHamm on July 25, 2015, 10:19:04 PMbut only the stuff that grows on the rind does the work.
Well, the little bodies of the bacteria inside contribute character when they die and add enzymes to the paste.
-Boofer-
Hi Boofer,
Do the b.linens do that too? I thought it was just the bacteria from the cheese cultures, not the ripening cultures, that did the "die and work on" processes? As I type this I'm thinking "I don't know why I would think that, but I did." This cheese thing can sure get interesting at times. Someone should start web site or forum on it! ;)
Why wouldn't any and all of the living and dying cultures contribute to final cheese character? :-\
-Boofer-
Well, it could be (for example) that when b.linens dies the products it creates don't influence the cheese any further. This could occur if it were either a simpler bacteria which breaks down into simple, non-flavour producing compounds or a more complicated bacteria, which again, breaks down into products that do no further interaction with the milk. (I"m making these up as a purely speculative set of hypotheses).
I guess I had always assumed that the cheese cultures, but not b.linens, were special and cultivated because they did these wonderful special flavouring duties, while b.linens worked on the outside.
As I say, now that I'm thinking about it I don't know why I had that assumption but when I found myself surprised at your suggestion that b.linens might degrade and flavour that way (which I knew other cultures did), it made me realize that I have always assumed b.linens didn't do this.
Hmmm, which then means, is there a noticeable difference between adding b.linens to the milk when you're making a cheese compared to spraying it on after the fact? There's an experiment in this just waiting to happen.
My cheese made some progress. The mold covered almost all the surface, but it started to smell. Is it normal? The smell is like in the french cheese stores, exactly the same, but I don't know if it's normal on the 8th day of ripening. I have no idea what ammonia smells like, I saw many posts about ammoniation of cheese but cannot tell whether its ammonia smell or nor.
I could use some advice. What does your camembert/brie smell like in the ripening process?
I open the lid and leave it for few minutes everyday for the cheese to "breathe". Today I found small islands of unknown mold (surely not PC) on the bamboo mat and replaced it with a sterilized one.
Quote from: Alex P. on July 27, 2015, 04:00:15 PM
My cheese made some progress. The mold covered almost all the surface, but it started to smell. Is it normal? The smell is like in the french cheese stores, exactly the same, but I don't know if it's normal on the 8th day of ripening. I have no idea what ammonia smells like, I saw many posts about ammoniation of cheese but cannot tell whether its ammonia smell or nor.
I could use some advice. What does your camembert/brie smell like in the ripening process?
I open the lid and leave it for few minutes everyday for the cheese to "breathe". Today I found small islands of unknown mold (surely not PC) on the bamboo mat and replaced it with a sterilized one.
If it smells like Brie, let it be.
Alex, which of the 2 methods did you use to get your results?
Quote from: itayoron on August 15, 2015, 11:25:39 PM
Alex, which of the 2 methods did you use to get your results?
Tried to use both of them, but the second time when I tried to use the spray method something went wrong with my cheese and I didn't get to use it. So the first attempt was direct inoculation, got some good rind (from 3 different cheeses, wanted to be sure!), mashed it in some clean water, filtered all the pieces to get rid of unnecessary "material" and used pouring it directly in the milk. The mold was growing like a charm.
Now the results. I made two cheeses, one of them had the smell that worried me. It was soft in 3 weeks, but it had a strong extra smell inside and was not edible... So I made a vivisection to see how the ripening process worked and got rid of the evidence.
I cut the second cheese yesterday. It was under-ripened a little, but the result was pretty ok. But it still has a little smell and taste inside, and the rind is very bitter. I don't know where's the problem. Could it be contaminated with something? I don't know how to describe the taste and the smell, but no store bought Camembert tasted like this before... The cheese on a hot toast was amazing though, exactly like a Camembert should taste like. But I want to know what led to the extra smell.
The cheese was stored in plastic tupperware for 3 weeks, then I wrapped it in parchment and stored in a colder place. My only thought is that the RH in the tupperware was too high, but still, it doesn't make complete sense to me.
Photo report of the unwrapping:
Sorry for the long delay in answering you, haven't been on the forum in a while.
Your cheese looks fine, exactly like a cam should look. The bare patches that are a little tan colored are probably B. linens. The smell, is probably from them not being able to off gas in the tupperware and my guess is that it is ammoniation. Truthfully, within sporting limits I like a little ammoniation in a camembert, gives it that barnyardy taste/flavor that I have come to associate with cams. A mini cave should breath a little to allow these byproducts to off gas and to keep the molds happy with a little oxygen.
a cheese for you
Thanks jmason. I didn't stop here, now I have two other Camemberts ripening. This time at lower temperature, I aim for longer ripening at 4 degrees Celsius. They are very well covered with white fur, now that I lowered the temperature it is growing very slowly. I hope to get rid of the ammoniation and get a perfect Camembert. With your hints and previous mistakes, I should get better results now.
-Alex
Hey Alex,
I am having the same problems here in El Salvador. Can I ask you what ingredients you ended up using for your camembert? And maybe which directions your followed?
Thanks!
Caroline