This will be last post about my recent cheese related actions and reactions. No more posting till May when I will crack open some of the ,,established stars", namely tries at Jack, Colby and an oil/smoked paprika hard. Sadly, no reactions to that post (in Hard Cheddared section) where I was presenting them hoping that someone would share their view on the ,,dead ripeners" problem that I have and with it related acid/moisture variable in context of vacuum-packing. It's a lengthy one, I'll admit that. It must be off-putting. I consider posting here more as an abstract cheese diary, a notebook of sorts where I can externalise my thoughts and make them visible firstly to my eyes, but also to eyes and minds of others. And also a way to express myself in these introverting and alienating times and also reconnect with people. When someone else share their view and experience, its a double win. And when they present some helpful or interesting data, then it's triple. I find that exciting cause in live contact I don't do that well with people. Back to cheeses. I know I should wait more and it is going to be frustrating if they turn out to be white, dense, brittle deadites of sourness but at designated point all three of them will be around 5 months old and with summer just around the corner maintaining them would be more of a burden than sweet anticipation. If it turns out to be sour dead crumbly mess again I will have to repack them, leave them deep in that pantry nook that I imagined as a cheese cave and seriously rethink this cheese making adventure of mine. Till that point sometime in May I will continue to gather thoughts, observe and care for the most recent ones, namely a circus freak one, a blue one and a Stilton style sourpuss (hopefully the blue will turn the tide as today I almost had it out of the mould and dunked in baking soda solution how much sour it smelled). So yeah, with a little bit more usable space activated as a cave and after accepting the fact that noting much can be done at this stage for the cheeses that are already vacuum-packed and hopefully doing their thing, I present to you in order of appearance – Moldy Drunken Baron, Blue One and Stilton Sourpuss – a third and last part of ,,Caves, blues and established stars". MDB stared as an idea of semi-hard B.linens ripened piece later washed with some sort of booze. I haven't even decided what would that be, wine or beer, and issues began to rise. Firstly there was no sign of B. linens. After I started covering it to raise humidity brown-green-black mold appeared. Then to battle that I stopped covering it which resulted in moderate but progressive cracking. At that point I said to myself it's time for blues. I cleaned and washed it with brine/vinegar and filled the cracks with a slightly creamy store bought blue and then applied a thin coat of it on the whole surface. This stopped both cracking and the unwanted mold. But not for long. The blue didn't take of as I was hoping for, and brown-black returned, as did the cracking. At that point I decided to call it a day and took out a bottle of plum brandy to drown my sorrows. Just kidding. But not about brandy. I started washing the cheese with pure brandy to battle newly developed moldy smell and remains of whatever living was on the rind, now full of cracks filled with remains of previously inserted blue mixed with deposits of salt, brandy and small pieces of the cheese itself that were cramped in there during washing. The main question is how risky would it be to vacuum-pack it now after being intentionally infected with red, blue, then unintentionally with brown-green-black and since then being washed with brandy multiple times? I will do it anyway because the rind is now dry and cracked beyond repair, but still it would be nice to hear some reflections from other members. It wouldn't surprise me if this one showed more character than any other that were cared after much more and being vacuum-packed at an earlier stage and longer. Apart from now severe cracking and that pesky mold that at this point struggles to survive in such dry environment ,,refreshed" by a generous splash of brandy now and then, the rind itself looks promising, if I dare to say – dry, hard, yellow and springy. But it smells moldy, almost off-puting moldy, not blue, not B. linensy, just plain moldy. Hopefully, the thorough mechanical cleaning, salt washing, sealing the cracks with butter and one last brandy wash before throwing in a vacuum will stop further development of that smell.
And now for the Blue One. I was satisfied with how this one turned out, at least in shape and outer looks department. And that is really hard to achieve considering almost all of my cheese doings were misfires more or less. Hopefully the inner looks, structure and taste won't be far. Now, a few days after taking this picture it's drying out and starting to develop a red-orange-brownish hue on the rind. It looks a bit more adult. Every few days it becomes tacky even though it is on the open air. That would probably be B. linens or leftover P. roqueforti trying to build up again. Either way, I wash it with brine and then leave it to dry. In a few cycles I will either wrap it in aluminium foil and transfer it to the fridge or leave it here on the open. In both cases for 3-5 extra weeks. It's still quite firm, plump piece of cheese that I'm looking forward to open. Your input about this last pre-eating step would be appreciated. Do the alu-foil wrap and fridge toss or continue current wash-and-dry routine on the outside with temps around 15C? It was made on 23rd of March.
As far as Stilton Sourpuss goes I won't drag about it as it is still in its early stages. It was made on 10th of April. Fragments of that are shown in the pictures. These are some details. Mix of 2.8% P/H milk plus 250 ml of completely dead (UHT) 36% cream. No ripening time. 1.5 hrs. of coagulation. After some reading I decided to try a mix of cutting and ladeling. Cuts were made only on the x and y axis about 2 inches apart to get rather large columns. 1.5 hrs. of "healing" followed by ladeling into two rectangular perforated containers to form solid blocks. There was way too much whey retention. I knew I was on the acid road again. As one of the containers was only partially perforated a was trying to motivate whey expulsion by agitating it occasionally. Curds in the other one formed a nice block, but when touched it would start to jiggle. So deceiving on the surface, like quick sand. It was full of whey despite container being perforated on all sides. Draining had to be extended overnight and still the blocks weren't sturdy enough to be cut into cubes. Obviously I made a mistake of not being concentrated and disciplined enough to properly conduct cloth bound draining stage and then pressing between two boards. I did press them however, against one another, one container was smaller so I stacked it on/in the bigger one. I thought that ladling in such containers would drain enough way. Boy, was I wrong.. Later that day I decided to try hacking the situation - sprinkling now thinner but still quite moist blocks with salt to try to intensify whey expulsion and firming the curd so it could be cut and moulded what ever the cost. It did the trick. After an hour or two I cut the blocks in inchish cubes and stacked them on a plastic serving board lined with paper towel to draw out some more whey. At that point it smelled awfully acidic so i decided to sprinkle again with salt and baking soda, but now directly in the cubes, mix them, wait for it to react with acid, soak up the salt, release some more whey and then wash them with water to drain smaller pieces that broke off and any excess salt/soda. Then I dried the cubes for an hour. So yeah, it wasn't that bad in the end. After managing to cramp all the cubes in one of my "moulds" I left it to compact itself in the mould with few flippings before going to bed. Though I had to apply some hand pressure to get the selfmoulding going. It was still very wet so it did compact enough during following days and continued to expel fair amount of whey. But still it smelled to acidic. At moments, I was on the verge of taking the whole damn thing, with mould on and soaking it in baking soda solution. Luckily, yesterday it stopped wheeping whey and started to dry noticeably with acidic smell slowly going away. It is still in the mould and I am flipping it twice a day while observing and waiting for blue to show up. Hopefully it will eat up any excess acidity.
I wonder if you are being unduly pessimistic. The stilton looks really good. Now all you have to do is wait a few weeks and then smear the cracks shut with a spatula. Whose recipe are you following? I don't mean to insult you but you sound a bit as though you are wandering around in the dark. I am very new to this fascinating business ( Nov 20) but my two books have mostly provided solutions and sufficiently detailed recipes to cover all eventualities. I have followed them to the letter and so far at least the results have greatly exceeded my expectations. Managing ph also seems really important. I think the hardest bit is controlling ageing conditions. Getting the temperature /humidity correct seems absolutely crucial. My brother who has been making cheese in Australia for forty years has major problems with temperature as his cellar is almost always too warm. This greatly increases his problems with rogue organisms and with cheese mites.
Thanks for the observant response. You can't be more right about me kinda wandering in the dark. I hit my leg more than once in that dark. :) About pessimistic stuff.. Yeah, that too. That's how I am, I suppose. Though in cheese making I found a reason to try letting myself go hoping it will pull the best out of me. Stilton does look good. It took only a few pictures for me to become aware of that. That's why I'm so happy I found this forum. I was relieved when the acidic smell started to fade. For this one I didn't follow any particular recipe. Mostly because I always have to extend coagulation and healing times and hack different stages in a recipe because of the poor milk quality. In the end following a recipe seems pointless when I am forced to change so much. I try to maintain the most prominent features of a recipe, an idea and adjust other things as best as I can in given circumstances. I did however read Stilton recipe from Cheesemaking.com and tried to hold that as a guideline. Also I read few Stilton related posts here on the forum. Hopefully the blue will take off by the end of the week. It is fascinating, cheese making, isn't it? So much potential for connecting people, rekindling one's passion for small things in life. It's like science, art and craft, all-in-one. About stuff you mentioned, ph levels, aging conditions, especially temp/humidity, unwanted organisms. Well, all those are quite hard to control in my circumstances. Somewhat similar to what your brother faces. I will have to find at least those ph indicator strips in order to step out of that biting sourness part of the dark, at least.
I think getting hold of a copy of Mastering Artisan cheese making by Gianiclis Caldwell would be well worth your while. I have found it a wonderful resource for those difficult questions. Its American but everything is translated into Metric measures. The recipes on the Cheesemaking website are really helpful but they tend to leave out quite a lot. I am fascinated know where you are in Serbia ? Belgrade? I spend a lot of time Romania which is next door to you.
I heard about that name and her book a lot here on the forum. I will look into it. I have to agree about Cheesemaking.com leaving out a lot. Maybe the recipes given there work best for people that are already skilled enough to read between the lines. I reside in city of Zrenjanin, some 70 km north from Belgrade. The region is called Banat and is actually historically/geographically shared with Romania.
That blue looks really cool. It's so orderly looking like the ribbing of a sock knit with variegated yarn
Just a heads-up, if you're not already doing it, always check the q&a's in the cheesemaking.com recipes, they are in a link right below the "equipment" section. There's often information there which can really help fill in the gaps and/or clarify things which are otherwise unclear in the main recipe.
I agree about Caldwell's book, it is very, very good. Lafux, I am an American but have been in India for the last few years. You should be able to sign up at amazon.com with a foreign credit card and order her book in electronic form through the kindle store. I'm pretty sure you don't have to have a kindle, you can download the kindle app onto a PC/android device (although I would think a mac would work as well? Not sure.)
Unfortunately it's almost as expensive as the hard copy version, but if Bulgaria is like India they will charge you an arm and a leg to ship a hard copy, at least you'll save that. Although since I am oldish/a Luddite I did get the paper version because I wanted to highlight/add marginalia/tabs etc, which was worth it to me. Be sure to get the advanced version, "Mastering Artisan Cheesemaking", not the basic version, all the info in the basic one is in the advanced one, and I think you would move through the first one pretty fast and want the second quickly anyway.
Thanks for kind words and additional advices. I did need some affirmation after a lot of misfires. Unfortunately, this happy look didnt last long as the Blue One cracked few days later. My bad, I was one day late with drying assessment. Cracks are pretty severe, but I don't mind too much. Maybe it's not a bad thing as it showed me a glimpse a of the insides - not veiny as I would like to - and hopefully air and some of the P. roqueforti survivors will find it's way through the cracks. So yeah, this could be a valuable information for others that like me aim at harder, drier blue cheese. I washed it with brine and wrapped in double alu-foil at around 15 C. I even thought to vac-pack it but decided first to hold it in foil for a week or so to see how it behaves. Maybe to wait to soften a bit and than vacuum it. If I vac-pack it now lack of oxygen will dramatically lessen the chance of further veining. If the foil isn't enough to retain moisture and stop cracks from expanding I will than vacuum-pack it. Surely it will be interesting to see how this one turns out in structure and taste department. It did have it's 5 minutes of glory in looks department so I am satisfied as far as that goes. Now I will definitely give it a go with this book. About Q&A section, I do read it and you are absolutely spot on with that observation. I did found there some valuable data. I need to read further. Fluctuations of willpower and concentration drops are challenges that I face on a regular basis. There is no cure for that other than passion and resilience, I would think. If that book is to be found around here somewhere, I will find it.