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Not my first camembert/brie attempt and like others here, not my first failure.  But this was an interesting, and instructional ride.

It was my first attempt at making one of these cheeses with ash, so pretty.





Two weeks later, the mold can only be described as generous:



Three weeks later, according to the recipe, it was ready.  But literally slipped out from the skin:



So I wrapped and put t'other two into the fridge, and assuming that was the end, forgot about them.

10 weeks after they were made . . .

Someone's a bit eager:


But now the curd was perfect.  No more liquid just under the skin, it was all of a consistent consistency. 



But at this point unsurprisingly ammoniacal.  We let it slip out and air out and ate it over three days, not the best cheesely goodness.



Next time I'll catch it in the middle!

Although they're my favorites, I'm only just learning about the proper conditions for these cheeses, not only the initial mold (dryness, saltiness, cultures) but also the affinage.  But I used just a small amount (1/8 tsp) of ash when I did my latest build, a big 9 incher, and it had pretty spectacular results:



-L








 

I have some thoughts about this (as usual!).  However, I lack the experience to really understand if I've got it right (as usual!).

How liquid the paste is depends on the pH.  The higher the pH, the more liquid the cheese will be.  Of course this is limited by the amount of whey left in the cheese, as well, but for these kinds of cheeses, I'm going to assume that there is enough whey to make it completely liquid.

The mould/yeasts on the outside of the rind breaks down the protein on the rind and produces ammonia.  It's important to note that ammonia is NH3 -- it requires the nitrogen from the protein in order to be produced.  The mould also does *not* grow more than a mm or so into the rind.  So the only food that the mould has is the rind.

When the ammonia is first produced, it is transported into the cheese.  This raises the pH and makes the cheese liquid.  However, it takes *time* for the ammonia to be transported into the center of the cheese.  This is why you initially get softening on the outside of the cheese, while the centre is hard.  When you taste the cheese, you can see that the centre is still quite acidic (tart), while the liquid part is not.

There is another issue.  Cheese protein (casein) exists in milk as balls of tightly wound up protein.  These balls are held together with calcium phosphate.  When you are making the cheese, the curd gets more and more acidic.  When that happens, the balls of protein relax a bit and the calcium phosphate dissolves in the whey.  This calcium phosphate reacts with the acid, "buffering" the pH.  In other words, it slows down (and can even stop, or reverse) the drop in pH.  Eventually, as enough acid is produced, all of the available calcium phosphate is used up.

When the ammonia is introduced later by the ripening cultures, if there is buffering capacity left in the curd, it will slow down the *increase* in pH.  However, we normally "bottom out" the pH of bloomy rinds.  This will produce the normal traditional, incredibly runny paste.  Instead we can make a "stabilised paste" by making sure that the pH of the cheese doesn't get below, say 5.2.  This retains some of the calcium phosphate and makes it so that when ammonia is produced in ripening, it will only *slowly* start to make the paste runny (and often it never gets fully runny).

So I think this "skin slip" is a normal feature of a traditionally made bloomy rind.  It happens simply because the pH is rising very fast on the outside of the cheese and the ammonia doesn't have enough time to migrate into the center of the cheese.  You can slow this down by salting the cheese earlier and thereby limiting the acidity of the curd (and hence preserving some of the calcium phosphate).

I think it is also likely that you can limit the amount of runniness by hitting a lower moister level in the cheese.  Commercial Camembert producers apparently aim for a 13% yield on their Camembert.  However, both times I've tried to make Camembert style cheeses, I've hit 18% yield -- which means I have a *lot* more whey in my curd than a commercial producer.  I have not seen a single recipe that seems like it should get anywhere near 13% yield, so I'm not sure what to make of this, but I'd like to experiment.

In terms of ammonia flavour, I think a lot of it depends on when you wrap the cheese and how long you age it.  As soon as you wrap it, you are limiting the ability of the cheese to transpire the ammonia.  I tend to think wrapping is probably a fix for modern mass produced cheeses rather than something that is desired (though I may be wrong).  I wonder if we are cargo culting it.  If you can wrap the cheese and age it, then it takes less space, and requires considerably less labour.  Also, it protects the cheese, since as it gets soft, it's easy to break the skin.  When it is wrapped it is less fragile.  But I wonder if sitting in a ripening box and flipping every day would result in a better cheese if you have the space in your fridge.

Quote from: mikekchar on February 24, 2020, 01:44:40 AM
In terms of ammonia flavour, I think a lot of it depends on when you wrap the cheese and how long you age it.  As soon as you wrap it, you are limiting the ability of the cheese to transpire the ammonia.  I tend to think wrapping is probably a fix for modern mass produced cheeses rather than something that is desired (though I may be wrong).  I wonder if we are cargo culting it.  If you can wrap the cheese and age it, then it takes less space, and requires considerably less labour.  Also, it protects the cheese, since as it gets soft, it's easy to break the skin.  When it is wrapped it is less fragile.  But I wonder if sitting in a ripening box and flipping every day would result in a better cheese if you have the space in your fridge.

Mike, interesting thoughts. I have made cams both ways - ripening boxes, which as you note take up a lot of space, and paper wrapped. I don't recall a difference, but it has been a long, long time since I used the ripening boxes (except for the first week or 10 days, to establish the mold). Maybe I'll try it both ways, next time, and see what the difference is.

I had thought, though, that the cheese wrapping paper allowed the migration of both oxygen and ammonia - it is supposed to be "breathable" without letting the cheese get dry. Yes? No? Maybe?

Thanks to both for your comments.  Mike, you clarified some of the things from Caldwell's book about the ripening process for these cheeses, so thanks for that.  Slowly . . . slowly, this is starting to make sense!  And now it's starting to make sense why (more importantly for me, how) the producers use a stabilized paste for the commercial market, and maybe I should too 

And I misspoke when I said I "wrapped" them, in fact they were in food storage containers with holes punctured in the lids, so hopefully there was opportunity for ammonia release.   So I don't know if that was better than wrapping them with the recommended "bloomy rind" plastic.

Thanks,
-Lance

Just my humble opinion, but ... no to stabilized paste. No, no, NO! I do not like it, Sam-I-am!

First ACFU

Shooting from the hip. With out a recipe/make sheet to look at to further evaluate.

1. Ash accelerates the de-acidification (primary reason for use) of the rinds surface along with yeast if you are using it.........you should with bloomies KL71. This leads to point number 2 below.   Number two reason to use ash, it is SEXY! Oh la la

2. Because the rind surface is de-acidified your white molds a mix of GEO and PC (Should Be) grows much much more quickly. This is desired to a point, rapid colonization of white molds helps keep blue mold off your bloomies. Too rapid of growth= two no buenos: 1. A thick leathery rind that is not tasty. 2 A much too rapid of breakdown of paste protein at the cheese surface=slipskin.

3. Ammonia  NH3 is heavier than air and sinks. Your cheese cave needs to breath.....the ammonia needs to be able to escape.........or your cheese will taste like what it is sitting in.....a pool of ammonia.

Thoughts:
1. With ashed rinds cut back 1/4-1/2 your recipes quantity of white molds. Note the higher your ratio of GEO to PC the more delicate and thinner your rind will be. Typical bloom progression when in "balance" is a dusting at day 3-4 and fully covered by days 7-10. Depends on cheese size, milk type, cave temp, humidity surface salt concentration. Over salting will stunt your bloom rate.

2.When your cheese is fully bloomed, pat the mold down good and wrap with a good two ply cheese paper like FromageX's Crystal and move to the fridge crisper for finale aging, 2-3 weeks. The cold stunts the white mold growth. When a bloomy rind cheese is fully bloomed, enough proteolytic and lipolytic enzymes have already been released and fridge time will let them work their way inward to soften the rest of the cheese body.

3. Bigger cheese cave! So your cheese can breath and more importantly so you can make more awesome cheese!!!

Great start, lets see more.