Hello,
I recently tried making Camembert cheese using the reciepe by David Asher which uses Kefir instead of adding a culture.
After air-drying the cheese for 24 hours and then washing the rinds with whey for another week in the cheese cave I am not letting it age in my cheese cave to develop the fungus. But a few days into this process (after finishing washing the rinds) the cheese are a little sticky to touch and I see small green molds growing (see the picture).
What is the problem?
What should I do?
The cave is usually around 9-12C at 90-95 humidity.
Thanks,
Yatir
Change your recepie. Cams aren't washed rind cheeses. You will need to have some way of adding the correct surface molds and yeasts to properly soften the cheese (usually a freeze dried culture or maybe small amounts of rind from another cam).
Thanks.
I understand it isn't the usual recipe. The reason you wash the rind every other day only for a week is to encourage the P candidum growth.
My question is: is there anything I can do now?
I'd spot remove the blue mold. Is there any cam growth?
It is my first time, so am not sure.
It is a little bit sticky. How can I tell?
The P. candidum will be fluffy and white if it shows up. It has never shown up spontaneously in my cave and I suspect it won't in yours either (which is also probably the reason that you were given the "change the recipe" advice ;-) ) The sticky, slimy texture is either yeast or potentially polysaccharides being formed by the starter culture. While "natural cheesemaking" is attractive, it is not really possible to produce precise cheeses unless your environment happens to contain the flora that you need -- and even then it's a balancing act that is unlikely to go right without a lot of effort.
Having said that, I think your cheeses will be delicious and you shouldn't worry about it not turning into cambembert.
Thanks! So, so long I discard the unwanted mold, if I age it enough you reckon it will turn out good?
Yes, definitely! Basically, cheese is a very precise thing. If you change things ever so slightly, the cheese you make can be quite different. However, if you have good sanitation, if you keep your starter culture alive so that the cheese is acidic enough and you have enough salt in the cheese, you will probably make delicious cheese. I don't have a lot of cheese making experience, but I think as a beginner it's a good idea just to make a lot of cheese. You can eat those cheeses any time you want (or not at all). The more cheese you make, the more experience you will get and the more everything will make sense. But in my limited experience, anyway, while making a specific kind of cheese requires some good planning and execution, failures are usually yummy.