I've been making cows' milk cheeses for some time now, but have never made any from goats' milk. That's about to change, though, as we just got some milking goats.
My question is mainly to do with start cultures. Most of the recipes I've seen call for a special chevre starter of flora danica. Can I just use a standard meso starter like MA19 or MA4001? I plan on making both fresh chevres as well as aged wheels - and maybe some mixed milk cheeses (with the cows' milk too).
Any other general pointers? I've tried searching the boards and have found references to other threads, but am having trouble finding the threads themselves.
Thanks!
Iain
Hi iain,
I use MM100 for my goat's milk chevre. I use the MM4001 for Camembert cheese. I don't have a whole lot of pointers about the differences between cow's milk and goat. All I have ever made is goat's milk cheese ;D.
Are you planning to pasteurize your milk or make raw milk cheeses?
I hope you are enjoying your new goats. Good luck with the cheese.
Bonnie
Thanks, Bonnie. Right now, the two does have three-month-old kids on them (one each) and aren't being milked. I'm planning on separating them at night and seeing what I can get out of them. Should be interesting.
I'll likely keep all the milk raw. Do you pasteurize your milk?
May I suggest that you start milking those girls right away if you intend to get any milk. By leaving the kids on and not milking 2x a day the doe will most likely dry up way sooner than you would like.
I pen up the kids up at night at around 2-3 weeks and milk the doe dry 2x a day every day. She will then milk steady for about 10 months.
We only pasteurize for the sale of fresh cheese. All fluid milk and aged cheeses are raw.
Thanks for the suggestion. The plan is to start Monday. Right now, the kids are still nursing, so hopefully it won't be too much of an issue.
I'm just a novice here but I've read a lot about chevre and been successful with a few batches even.
From what I've figured out by reading this board, other websites and also from the recipe at Fias Co Farm, the special chevre cultures may include a little teeny bit of rennet so you don't have to figure out the 1/5 drop like that listed at Fias.
My raw goat's milk is from a favorite farmer and neither of us ever pasteurize the milk before making cheese. Now, if it was for sale, that would be a whole different story.
Oh, I use the MM100 and that fun little bit at FCF about getting 1/5 drop.
I mean to remove the kids at night at 2 weeks old. Then let them run with mom all day. They nurse all day but you get milk from all night. Your doe will most likly have very little milk at this piont since the kids are almost weaned.
1/5 of a drop is easy... 1/4 cup water add 3 drops stir take out 1 TBs.
Update: I separated the kids from the does overnight and milked the two does this morning. I got just shy of 2 quarts, combined. Not bad for the first day out. On later lactations, I'll definitely be splitting them up sooner. We just got these goats, though, and they came with kids on, never milked. I'll going to try my first batch of chevre after tomorrow's milking.
Iain
To get 1/5 of a drop of rennet:
Put 1 drop rennet in 5 Tbls water, use i Tbls of this mixture. (1 divided by 5 = 1/5.)
Steff, your method yields 3/4 drop of rennet.
I also use the MM100 for my fresh Chevre - works great. As far as I know, you can use any of the cultures you'd normally use for cow's milk with the goat's milk. I generally use MA-11 for most of my aged cheeses (Cheddar, Jack, Colby, Caerphilly, etc.).
Good luck with the goats, but be careful - they're VERY addictive!
D