Not really a washed curd cheese but this board looked like the best place. I started this one four days ago using Gianaclis Caldwell's recipe. The make went as follows:
10 litres Fleurieu milk; 3.3% protein, 3.8% fat P:F = 0.87:1
5/12 tsp (2 ½ tads) Flora Danica
1/12 tsp (a dash) Swiss and Italian
2.5ml rennet in 50ml water
3ml CaCl2 in 60ml water
Warmed the milk to 27o C.
Added the starters, rehydrated for 2 minutes, stirred for 3min.
Temp increased to 32C over 22 min. Maintained for 15 min.
Stirred in the CaCl2 and rested for 5 min.
Stir in the rennet for 3 min. Flocculation time 16 ½ min. (Flocculation multiplier = 3.5x. Goal = 45 min.) Covered and left. Coagulation time = 58 min.
Cut the curd into 1 cm cubes. Rest 5 min.
Gradually raised the temperature to 38oC over a period of 30 minutes with gentle stirring. Held 20 min with stirring until curds pass texture test.
Drained whey to level of curds.
Hand pressed curd mass to about the size of the mould. Drained remaining whey.
Transferred curd mass to a cloth lined mould and gently pressed into mould.
Allowed to drain without weight for 15 min at 24-27C.
Turned, added weight about ½ kg for 30 min. Turned again and left for a further 30 min.
Turned and increased weight to about 1kg for 6 hours. Turned at 1 hr, 2 hrs and 4hrs. (Goal pH 5.2-5.4, achieved pH~5.2)
Moved to 13C overnight.
Weight before brining about 1.5 kg. Brined 9 ½ hrs.
Air dried for 3 days then moved to 13C at about 85%.
All looking good at this stage. Weighs in at 1.3 kg at this stage.
That looks good. Might be a bit moist still, the white spots on the yellow rind often will weep moisture so keep an eye on it and get ready to plug any holes that may form as the rind firms up. Maybe cover with salted butter type thing (to keep mould from invading the internals. Probably won't have any issues, but just being cautious. A cheese to you.
Thanks Jeff. Really valuable advice. Given the weight I would not be at all surprised to see it lose some more whey.
Three weeks on and time for the first brushing. All going well. No holes appeared.
A varied wildlife has appeared: Geo, blue-greens, turquoise blue, some grey and a white mould which is either thick geo or a bit of PC. Underneath is some fluoro yellow which only appeared when it was brushed.
It's going to be interesting to see how this ecosystem develops.
Really interesting looking at your microflora compared to my local ones.
Quote from: Stinky on August 29, 2015, 03:27:14 PM
Really interesting looking at your microflora compared to my local ones.
Same here. Sweet-looking rind development so far.
-Boofer-
Nice. That will end up being a great wild rind. Keep brushing it back once a week or so. More frequently if it gets feeling "soft and velvety" due to a carpet of mould growing.
Quote from: Stinky on August 29, 2015, 03:27:14 PM
Really interesting looking at your microflora compared to my local ones.
We pride ourselves on the uniqueness of our wildlife here in the Antipodes.
Thanks for the comments, Boofer.
Jeff, thanks for the advice. Always valued.
It's finally ready, just in time for Christmas, after turning and brushing every week or so.
The result is great: a firm, smooth texture with a lovely complex flavour.
Together with a double Gloucester and a Camembert, this will make up the Christmas cheese board.
Wow, killer rind!
Any flavor/texture description, Andrew?
A cheese for your efforts.
-Boofer-
That is truly a cheese of beauty! Congratulations! And another cheese for you!
Oh Wow ! I agree Killer Rind - I hope it tastes as extreme as it looks :)
AC4U
- Mal
Thanks for the kind comments and the cheeses.
As for the description, Boofer, not my strong suit but here goes.
This is a semi-hard cheese with a firm texture but not crumbly. The taste is very good: somewhat nutty but not overpowering.
No, Mal, it's not as extreme as it looks, which is probably just as well. I served it up in a cheeseboard as part of the first of the family Christmas festivities last night. It was universally well received. I didn't see anyone cutting off the rind and the assembled company were by no means all hardened cheese-heads.
Merry Christmas to all in the cheese-making community.
RP:
A cheese for you also. I love the rind and have just made a large Tomme and hope to "train" the rind as you have done.
Kern
AC4U! :-)
The photo below shows a large Tomme (7.9# after brining) made on December 11. This used raw milk and was cultured with Kazu, MD-89 and LH-100. Added to the milk in the hopes of developing a colorful rind was KL-71, Mycodore, Geo 15 and B. Linens. The completed cheese was put in a ripening box in my 55F cave and the humidity was maintained at 90-92% for ten days to allow mold to develop. By the end of ten days the cheese showed some Geo growth and perhaps some KL-71 and white Mycodore but no blue, brown, yellow black or anything else.
I moved the cheese box to my garage bench and covered the box with a draining screen. The temperature held steady at around 55F with the humidity at 90%. It stayed there a week with two washings of a morge made with the KL-71, et al. Still nothing interesting. Perhaps my garage is a sterile environment? ;) So I decided to try a little experiment.
I made a "brew" of distilled water, a little salt, a couple of drops of vinegar, some invert sugar (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_sugar_syrup) (for the glucose), and some water extract of a balanced fertilizer for a little nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium (NPK). This should be a pretty good growing media for yeasts and mold. This was placed covered as shown below on the bench near the cheese . Sure enough, in about five days I had some interesting stuff growing in the little glass bowl - nothing on the cheese.
I don't know what I've got. There is some whitish mold (yeast?) with a gray center and some darker material on the bowl sides. I don't see any noticeable blue molds. I am attempted to inoculate the the Tomme rind with this. My theory (and justification?) is that the spores landing in the bowl also landed on the cheese but just never got started. I'd just be helping things along if I did this. Thoughts? Ideas? Opinions?
Well Kern, you certainly deserve some good results with all the effort you're putting in. You make me almost feel guilty that mine just rolled along and did the right thing with minimal effort from me. It's not as though I had done a lot of these before to develop a good flora or even added any cultures.
I suspect that if you give it time things will turn up. You've certainly got a nice wheel to start with. Here's hoping that all those good spores arrive.
If you do more natural rinds you might end up with more mold. My fauna rinds got more diverse over time.
You could also try making an overly humid cheese, and hoping you establish some sort of mold presence from that.