Hello!
My name is Sabrina and I am from Quebec, Canada. I am new to cheesemaking, I have made these so far: Chevre (several times, great results), mozzarella (several times, great to very poor results), haloumi (once, medium result), monterey jack (once, failure, molded, I was missing some wax on part of it I think).
I made all those with store bought pasteurized milk. Now I am moving on to raw milk because I raise goats :) Yes, I do deal with those little devils on a daily basis!
It is strange how it changes the texture of my yogurt and sour cream, they are much thinner than when I used milk from the store (cow). I think it is because the molecules are much smaller in goat milk and it has less casein. Anyhow! I will learn about using raw milk over time. I know that I can pasteurize it to avoid the "competition" between my starter and the natural occurring bacteria in the raw milk, so that might be a start.
So basically, here I am! I want to become better at cheese making and I want to understand how to deal with goat milk a little better, this is why I joined here.
My main language is french so please excuse any mistakes :)
Here's my equipment: cheese cloths, thermometer, PHmeter (for my next mozzarella batch, didn't use one with store-bought milk but now I need it!), wax, a cheese press, a few cultures, rennet and calcium.
I will be happy to learn from you guys :) Any suggestions as to which cheese to attempt next with my goat milk? I have about a quart or a bit more stashed now and I am ready for another attempt.
Thanks,
Bienvenue!
Sorry I don't speak very much french yet, I am still learning. :)
This is a great place for information and everyone is very helpful.
Personally I have very little experience with goat milk, but be aware that raw milk cheeses need to be aged longer for safety unless you pasteurize it first.
I have found, though, that your cheese will look, feel and taste better if it's fresh!
I love making cheddar style and am currently trying to perfect the alpine style, but I really loved making blue cheese!
Good luck!
Welcome Sab77. If you trust your milk I wouldn't pasturize it. Goat milk is certainly different to use and weaker curds can be one side effect. Here is a link to one of Gort's posts: https://cheeseforum.org/forum/index.php/topic,16589.msg127354.html#msg127354 (https://cheeseforum.org/forum/index.php/topic,16589.msg127354.html#msg127354) He has a lot of experience with goat milk and a lot of great recipes if you look thru all of his posts (click on his user name and then click show posts).
The common threads are with raw goat milk use less starter and adjust your rennet to your milk by using the floc method for judging time to cut.
Hello to both of you and thank you for the welcome.
CheesyJapaneesy, you make blue cheese? Wooowww.. my dad would be so proud and happy if I could ever make blue cheese. Yes I have read about the aging longer with raw milk! I am not sure I can age cheese here, I wonder if I have the proper conditions (humidity, temp, away from dog's mouth.. ).
River bottom farm, thank you, great hint. I checked out Gort's post but there are 42 pages HAHA. I found a few of his recipe, all too complicated for me now. I only have mesophilic culture for now, I will try to use the search function and see if he has a recipe with only that one in it. It was a great reference, I read on his does, milking, etc., and it was very interesting. Very close to me, we have the same goat breed :) He mentionned a cheese made with the natural bacteria of the milk and this is something that very much interest me.
If I trust my milk? I am not sure.. I have drank it and my family also for 4 weeks now, but I always worry that a batch will be bad (not clean enough hands, or left outside in the hot too long, etc).
I will continue to read Gort now, because I have a LOT of milk waiting to be "cheesed" lol.
Welcome to the forum!
We have both goats and cows and never pasturize milk unless we have to (sometimes for yogurt to get a firmer consistency). You have to do something horribly wrong to get bad raw milk when hand miking (sick animals or horrible miking practices). The way I see it the milk is actually safer in it's raw form if contamination is around because it has natural Flora that can out compete anything introduced. It's just a matter of if you like the taste of the natural Flora or not.
I don't want to be controversial, but statistically speaking that's incorrect. There is a dramatically higher incidence of sickness as a result of raw milk beverages and cheese than with pasteurised milk: USDA propaganda on the subject :-) https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/dangers-raw-milk-unpasteurized-milk-can-pose-serious-health-risk (https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/dangers-raw-milk-unpasteurized-milk-can-pose-serious-health-risk)
However, if you look at the statistics, 2 million people in the US drink raw milk daily. There were 144 hospitalisations in *10 years* in the US. So assuming these 2 million people drink 500 ml of milk a day each, that's 1 hospitalisation in ~250 million litres of milk. You are actually more likely to be seriously injured riding your bicycle than drinking raw milk.
So it's a bit like a lottery. Even if you drink raw milk your whole life, you are still vanishingly unlikely to get seriously ill. But someone *will*. The laws that are put into place are meant to decrease the number of illnesses. For the vast majority of people, pasteurisation poses absolutely no drawbacks and so even though the risks are small, it makes sense to do. For cheese makers? I think there is a significant argument that raw milk is worth the risk.
Disclaimer: if you get sick from raw milk, note that I said *somebody* would. It might be you ;-)
I think a lot of that comes from adaptation. People who always drink UHT milk, for example, would probably get sick easier if they drank raw milk.
I think it's the same reason we see more allergies these days... kids don't eat enough dirt anymore ;)
Does the USDA data distinguish whether the raw milk is produced from one's own animals, hand-milked as RBF says, vs. raw milk that is purchased? I would guess that this could make a significant difference, given that the latter involves a lot more handling of the milk - bottling it, moving it from point A to point B, putting it out on the store shelves - a lot more opportunities for contamination or less-than-optimal temperatures.
There are the environmental bacteria species that can taint raw milk, which as previously discussed can be avoided by using strict hygiene milking practices. There are also others that can come through the milk via infected animals...brucellosis, tuberculosis, Johne's disease...regardless of clean milking practices. Fortunately, dairy animals can be tested for the presence of these bacteria and if they test negative there is no cause for concern.
I think there will always be an ongoing debate regarding raw vs. pasteurized milk...there are pros and cons for each milk type...whichever is regarded as "best" depends on personal preference and values.
Interestingly, I just saw a video that touched on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sdBFqIsX1Q (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sdBFqIsX1Q) (Quite far through the video, but the first half is interesting anyway... I recommend watching at double speed, though) The guy had a graph that shows the percentage of different types of bacteria in raw milk.
There are grossly 3 types of bacteria: cold loving, room temperature loving, and warm loving. Most of the "bad" bacteria (lysteria, etc) are in the "cold loving category" -- so this is temperature from 0 C up to about 15 C (from memory). What they found was that after several days at refrigerator temps, the cold loving bacteria comprises something like 50% of all the bacteria in the milk. When it comes out of the cow, it's something like 10% (again from memory -- you can look for the graph in the video :-) ).
So milk right out of the cow that hasn't been refrigerated (in theory) should be much better. Linuxboy (in the Tomme thread, I think) also talked about pre-ripening milk. The idea was that if you take raw milk that you can't use right away, you should ripen it at higher temps until you get a specific pH drop and then refrigerate it. He claimed that this made his 5 day old milk almost as good as his new milk for cheese making. (BTW, I have no idea if this is actually a good idea, so try it at your own risk)
I think the USDA's position is very general out of necessity. Being a computer programmer, I'm very much aware that the average person does *not* pay attention to details. If you say "Raw milk is completely safe if you drink it right out of the cow", they hear "Raw milk is completely safe, blah, blah, blah". So the USDA says the opposite: "Raw milk can potentially make you very sick" -- because it will lead to less illness, which is their job.
This is so very true. Especially in the US.
Lots of people don't care enough to read the fine print, so it's better just to say no.
:p