[ In the US — All temps are in Fahrenheit — All measurements in US gallons ]
I am making traditional Mozzarella for the first time. I've seen where it took people ages to get the curd's pH to drop down low enough to be acidic enough to stretch. >2 days sometimes. Well... I got started later in the day that I would have liked, so I went to bed after two hours of letting the curd acidify in a 102 degree water bath. (had the curd in one big mass, sitting in a dry pot that was half-submerged in the 102-105-degree water). I was turning the curd mass over every 30 min. before I went to bed.
This morning, after an 8-hour sleep, the curds were still sitting there on the counter. The water bath temp had dropped to room temp; well below 100 degrees and probably had been for most of the night. But I heated some whey to 175 degrees and made a stretch test. It did not stretch at all. The curd got softer after a minute or two in the hot whey... and I could easily smoosh it with my fingers, but when I tried to stretch it... it just ripped in a crumbly way. So... I assume the pH just never got low enough. So... I made the hot water bath scenario again, and the curds are currently back at 102 degrees... and the waiting game resumes.
This experience has raised some questions for me and I was wondering if any of you with more experience might be able to help.
- I know that Mozz curd that is too high, will not stretch. So, you just need to let it acidify more. But how can you tell if the curd has gone past 5.2 and is "too acidic?" sThe obvious answer is with pH meters or paper. But... without any pH measuring assists, how can you visually tell? Can you?
- If you've been waiting for days for your curd to acidify to below 5.2, and it just isn't budging... I am quite sure that some serious doubt will set in that it will ever drop in pH, and a lot (most) people would end up tossing it. But is there any way to "save it?" Meaning... if you sprinkle citric acid powder... or maybe dilute it in some water and pour diluted citric acid over the curds... can you after-the-fact acidify the curd to where it needs to be?
1) If you let it go too far the curd breaks down and the cheese will disolve when you heat it and try to stretch it.
2) at the stage where you have already used rennet to make a curd if you try to disolve it or mix in ingredients the cheese will not re coagulate so will never hold together again. Could mix in some herbs and make a ricotta or chevre style spread if you want to.
Quote from: River Bottom Farm on August 10, 2019, 05:13:54 PM
1) If you let it go too far the curd breaks down and the cheese will disolve when you heat it and try to stretch it.
2) at the stage where you have already used rennet to make a curd if you try to disolve it or mix in ingredients the cheese will not re coagulate so will never hold together again. Could mix in some herbs and make a ricotta or chevre style spread if you want to.
I cannot tell if I've gone too far or not. I have been checking it every 1/2 hour, and the curd just is not stretching. When I pull them out of the put, the curd is very firm and rubbery. Like a pencil eraser. When I drop a piece into the 180 deg. water... it doesn't dissolve at all... it just sits there. but when I pull it back out, and it is all hot and mushy... when I try to stretch it... all it does is plop into two pieces with a crumbly edge where they separated. When I push the two pieces back together, they do not knit back into a curd, but instead, just mash into two balls of what feels kinda like ricotta.
I wouldn't be concerned, except, when I taste the curds now, they are starting to taste... well... not like the fresh milky aroma of fresh mozzarella... but more like... a cheese. if that makes sense. They don't taste "sharp." They just have... well... they have a flavor. Mozzarella, in my mind has almost no tangy cheese taste, and is just this fresh expression of wolid milk. I am either getting close, and they are going to stretch... or... they are too acidc now, and I'm just tasting the acid.
Hmmm...????
The time it takes for the curds to reach the proper pH can vary quite widely, depending on the milk, the type of culture, and possibly the phase of the moon. (Okay, maybe not that last part!)
Using store-bought P&H milk (all I have access to, unfortunately) and TA61 thermophilic culture, I've had curds hit 5.2-5.3 within a couple of hours, and I've had them take considerably longer. But more often faster than slower. So ... you may well have gone past 5.2, maybe overnight, maybe even before then!
Quote from: awakephd on August 10, 2019, 08:27:32 PM
The time it takes for the curds to reach the proper pH can vary quite widely, depending on the milk, the type of culture, and possibly the phase of the moon. (Okay, maybe not that last part!)
Using store-bought P&H milk (all I have access to, unfortunately) and TA61 thermophilic culture, I've had curds hit 5.2-5.3 within a couple of hours, and I've had them take considerably longer. But more often faster than slower. So ... you may well have gone past 5.2, maybe overnight, maybe even before then!
Well Damn! I just saw on the internet (Gavin Webber) and I read on this forum how the curd took overnight to stretch. So, I thought that they would acidify later rather than too soon.
Now I really don't know.
I just finally decided to toss it. The curds taste a little sour. This tells me that they are more acidic than 5.2. Looks like I need to invest in some pH strips. Damn
Definitely if you can taste the acid then you are down to 4.9 or lower territory. It's too bad that you tossed it. Just brine it up and you have a nice fresh cheese! I'm still to make a pasta filata cheese, but I've made a *lot* of yogurt in my life. Normally a thermophilic culture will take 5-8 hours to hit a pH of 4.9 (the point at which yogurt will start to thicken at 108 F). I assume the same is true of curds. I've seen a video of a mozzarella factory stretching curd at 5.0, which seems a little low to me, but apparently it still stretches. I think it won't happen at 4.9 or lower -- and the "frayed edges" of the curd that you saw is pretty typical, I think (or at least I've seen that in some of my lower pH fresh cheeses).
BTW, one of the interesting things I saw in this video was that they were literally cheddaring the curds (cutting and stacking in a warm environment). When I finally get around to doing it, I think I'll probably do the same.
I think if you block out enough time you can probably get it to work without the pH papers -- you just have to be on top of it. But like I said, I haven't done it yet ;-) I'm actually really keen on doing a Kascaval so will probably try that next week -- *if* I can find an 8 hour block where I'm unlikely to be interrupted.
Anyway, don't be discouraged! This is one of the hardest types of cheese to make! I think once you get your process dialed in, though, it will probably be no problem.