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CHEESE TYPE BOARDS (for Cheese Lovers and Cheese Makers) => ADJUNCT - Blue Mold (Penicillium roqueforti) Ripened => Topic started by: Smidgen on November 08, 2018, 04:33:30 PM

Title: My cheese is moldy, now what?
Post by: Smidgen on November 08, 2018, 04:33:30 PM
About 2 weeks ago I made a Fourme d'Ambert.  It's a brined version that was lightly pressed and has some nice little voids in it for mold to develop.  The cheese was pierced right after the brining and drying period.  I placed it in a small bucket which I tightly covered with foil, in the cheese fridge at 54 F.  I thought this setup would keep air flow to a minimum (to retain humidity) while still allowing some oxygen exchange for good mold growth.  It worked very well.  In fact now I feel that I'm ahead of schedule on mold growth and I'm wondering what to do.  This picture is 13 days after pressing:

(https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4833/45782943941_b84fa46542_b.jpg)

To me it looks fantastic.  I'm just wondering what I should do at this point to prevent over-ripening.  Should I scrape the mold off at some point?  Wrap it in foil?  Put it in a sealed container to slow the mold growth?  Transfer it to a regular cold fridge?  I have searched the forum and everywhere else and found very little info on this topic.  I was planning to age this for about 8 weeks but with this fast growth I'm now thinking maybe 4-6 weeks is plenty.