Hi all, I'm Jen in Western Colorado! I'm new to cheese making and hope to learn the ins and outs. My success rate has been 50/50 so far and I want to know where I went wrong. So far, successful soft cheese and farmer cheddar. Failures: gritty mysost and moldy farmer cheddar. I'm reading through mysost posts but if you know why it turned gritty, I'd appreciate the advice. I hate to let the why go to waste.
Welcome! Are you buying milk or milking your own dairy animals?
Thank you for your reply! I have been buying the milk. I wanted to be able to make cheese successfully before investing in livestock. The milk I used was the Kolona Supernatural grass fed organic whole milk..it's pasteurized but not homogenized.
I would suggest taking a short commercial course , I know cal poly San Luis Obispo has one a week long ,and I am sure there are others around. You will shorten the learning curve dramatically as well as make connections for issues you might run across down the road . Sometimes success has a lot to do with who you know not what you know .
My guess is it will a lot cheaper in the long run than all the mistakes , losing a couples of weeks worth of product due to a mistake could be very costly
Gregore
I would recommend talking to Linda and Larry Faillace of Three Shepherds Cheese in Vermont, and taking their classes if you can. Not only can they instruct you in cheese making, they can give you all the ins and outs of starting a commercial business and help you get started, they have done many such efforts. Linda and Larry are insanely knowledgeable and just good people as well. (Be prepared for stories! cheese and otherwise.) In addition, I have found that all small-scale cheese producers are more than willing to welcome you in and assist in your efforts.