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Yeah I got that yesterday too. I told him about the chaffing dish warmer maybe he can make it bigger. He didn't give any details I wonder what his idea is?

I sent him an email,  based of of Quesa's post, asking for more info including time line of when he thought he might have his product developed.  I can tell already that I will want something bigger than my 12 qt pot.

If that were reasonably priced, I would definitely buy one. Maintaining temperature can be a chore and a piece of equipment that would allow me to do that without constantly watching would make me much more likely to make cheese on any given day.

Sounded good and he said reasonably priced - what ever that means. I told him I wanted something bigger than 7 gallons. I think he was talking 2 to 6 gallons. Steves a pretty good guy I wonder what he's making?

As with may I also was contacted by Steve and gave him my feedback. A more serious vat setup is the next thing in line for me now that I have outfitted by lab setup. One priority is to decouple myself from the stove. My current setup is two three gallon SS pots on risers siting in a large steam table pan that spans two burners. It works, I can do a 6 gal make but has its limitations. Fabing a double wall rig with drains for whey and the heating water is still a work in progress. There have been great discussions of the thermo/heater issues on the forum. I'd sure like to hear others ideas on getting to a double wall with all the plumbing. My current ideas of SS sink-in-sink still needs more than a little work.

Cheers

Quote from: Quesa on January 16, 2010, 02:03:12 PM
I got an email from The Cheesemaker about a cheese vat he's designing.

"As a home cheese maker I always find it challenging taking the whey off the curd mass in my warming vessel(or pot).  I have a proposed design for a small (up to 6 gal.(22.7 liters) milk warmer (cheese vat) which will include an adjustable self draining spout so one can easily turn a knob and slowly drain off the whey instead of scooping the whey off the curds. The bottom of the warmer would be pitched slightly so whey slowly drains to the middle of one end of the warmer.  This proposed warmer would be priced so us home and small artisan cheese makers can easily afford it. This warmer would utilize a heating element and heating controller.

If there is enough demand for this product I will continue with it's development. Is this a product that would be beneficial for your home cheese making?

Thanks so much for helping and your thoughts.

S**** S******
www.thecheesemaker.com

I emailed Steve asking if he had a ballpark price and timeline.  Here is his reply:

Hi Deb:  Like you, sometimes I need to heat up 6 gallons of milk and scooping off the whey is always a bit time consuming.  Siphoning would not work, so I have my friend who now manufactures my cheese press work on developing a 6 inch stamped stainless pan with a drain port on one end, handles on each top end and the bottom being pitched toward the center and pitched toward the end with the drainage port.  Presently he is producing a prototype of the pan so I can warm some milk and test it.  I need to make sure that curd do not stick, get stuck in or inhibit any drainage.  I expect success, but one must test a prototype first.  This pan would be able to sell separately to those who already have the standard restaurant type food warmers.  I will also be supplying the warmers for those who do not already have one.  These warmers can hold up to 6 gallons of milk with 1/4 inch of space from the top.  Once the prototype is tested and production is scheduled I expect 2-3 months for product to be available.  From today, I'm hoping that I have can product available in 4 months or so.  I don't expect the pan or the warmer to be terribly costly.  I hope both could be aquired for under $200.  But I won't know how much for another few weeks.

Thanks for writing and feel free to post any of this on the forum.  The cheeseforum.org is a great way to trade ideas, though I have little time to spend on it.  And I don't like to self promote on forums.   I'm too busy just trying to service my customers so their cheese making becomes successful.

Take care,

Steve Shapson
Cedarburg Homebrew, Wine & Cheese
W62N590 Washington Ave.
Cheddarburg, WI 53012
www.thecheesemaker.com
steve@thecheesemaker.com
414-745-5483

Well I guess that leaves me out I already use a food warmer with a 7 gallon pan. I was hoping for 10. 
and a siphon hose does work if you put a strainer in front of it.

Yes, I got this email too. Told him that this may be an issue for an apartment dweller with limited space such as myself, but if the vat is equipped with a built-in digital thermometer/thermostat, pH meter and hygrometer and can be used afterward for ripening with a cover or other purposes than it's worth consideration. I would love to see some multi-purpose equipment for cheesemaking. Steve by the way is a super nice guy and was extremely helpful when I began making Camemberts.

Deb - Where did you find the 7 gallon food warmer pan? I have only found up to 5 gallon.

Sailor it's an 8 inch deep chaffing pan. I got it from Kitchen Supply Direct but their link isn't working anymore.

Thought I'd chime in on how I used to deal with the problem back in the 70's when I was making farmhouse cheddar and pot cheese.  I have to give the late hubby credit...he came up with a old roaster needing work on it.  LOL Back then the old electric roaster oven was a 1 piece affair...or at least the one we rescued had no tub to sit inside it.  I put a large canning rack...(the flat sort that goes in a large pressure canner to keep jars from bouncing off a boiling bottom).  Then I put the large canning enameled pot on top of that and filled roaster with hot water from another canner.  It worked well for several reasons. 

1...the roaster is insulated pretty well as you can attest by touching the sides while cooking. 

2....the element that "cooks" is not on the bottom of the roaster but rather surrounds it about half way up.  (I don't know where the thermostat is located) 

3...and most important for a short gal that had trouble messing with curds in tall double boiling canners on top of the stove.  I just used the roaster on a cart (they used to make carts for those roasters) and it put everything at a comfortable level as well as allowed me to wheel it into pantry after adding all the water and before rennet if I had kids that might disturb it.  Anyways...30 years later the newer roasters have the tubs that sit inside. 
He was extremely mechanical and always threatened to make a tub out of one of the many old glass water heaters he collected...*sigh*.  Something about their thermostats and glass walls intrigued him.   I thought he was crazy...but he generally found ways to use stuff like that to the point he actually asked if he could have peoples old water heaters...which they gladly gave him knowing they didn't have to haul to a dump.   Thank goodness we had a large fenced mechanics yard that hid his obsession from anyone visiting.  LOL!

He also had a simple solution to the removing whey issue once.  It was a thing that one can use to siphon kerosene out of large containers on farms but he made these or picked our up somewhere. I think perhaps folks use something smaller on home brewing??? Seems like I saw that in a pic once.  However he used them for things like aquariums and my canners.  No idea where he came up with stuff like that..it had a collapsible bulb attached to a large 1 inch or wider plastic straight  (stiff) tube (no worries with little curds clogging it and a more flexible tube that hung off to drain into bucket/pot.  The end of the tube that went inside cheese pot had a angle to it that allows one to not have a suction stick to a the bottom of an aquarium or a pot.  All but the bulb was boil able and I used a long bottle type brush to keep any film off.   Used properly there is no liquid that enters the bulb.  *of course we did not use same contraption for projects...we had separate ones for each thing. 

Hope this give ya some ideas.