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I read this quote in one of those books that were just posted:



"Rennet does not Exhaust itself. As has been
said concerning enzymes, rennet does not seem to
spend its energy, but will act over and over again. If
we coagulate a quantity of milk, and apply the whey
to a like quantity of milk, the milk will be coagulated;
we could do this indefinitely, if it were not for
getting a larger volume of whey than we have of
milk."


Anybody tried this or is this old news?

Some of the old books available for download have alluded to this process. I haven't tried it though it sounds reasonable.

Enzymes are proteins and they will eventually "fall apart" (called denaturation), they don't last forever.  This is why you can't save a diluted rennet for days.  Granted, the whey probably provides a more hospitable environment than distilled water, but still the enzyme doesn't last forever.

Also, enzyme is diluted to a proper concentration in the first whey and adding it to more milk dilutes it more.  Too little enzyme and you don't have enough to coagulate the milk.

Rennet is relatively inexpensive, so why risk ruining a good cheese?

Foregive me but if the rennet isn't fully consumed then isn't one adding too much rennet?

Also, I'd of thought adding previous batches whey to milk was to propagate the fresh batch of milk with the lactic acid producing and other cultures, if left for right time and temp this should then produce a lactic acid coagulated curd good for soft cheeses.

Farmer, was there any context to that quote ie soft or hard cheeses etc?

Sailor, I was just curious when I read it. I am always thinking about what I would do if I didn't have access to the stuff I buy so it kind of jumped out at me when I read it. It also raised a question in my mind about how rennet actually works.


John, the book was on cheddar. Verrrry old. 1890's. Here is a link. see pg 11


After reading it again, it may have been just a little bit of ignorance on the author's part. There were several other things in the book that were way behind. It was kind of funny thinking that I know more about the science behind it than they did back then, but they could turn out better cheese than me.

I think he was just making a point about the nature of enzymes, that they don't get used up in a reaction.  It didn't seem like he was saying this was a common practice and he did point out that the volume would become a limiting factor.  I do think you could quickly transfer whey from a newly curdled milk and continue to get some activity in new milk.  I don't think you could store the whey and use it a day later though.  Enzymes do tend to denature after a time, that or they lose some cofactor that is required for activity.

As far as being able to make cheese in the absence of storebought materials, you can rely on the natural clabber process or you can find some native plant like stinging nettle and make your own rennet.

Thanks for the link to the book.  Its pretty interesting, just in the first several pages I learned some basics of the composition of milk.

Quote from: FarmerJd on January 30, 2010, 12:00:17 AM
I read this quote in one of those books that were just posted:



"Rennet does not Exhaust itself. As has been
said concerning enzymes, rennet does not seem to
spend its energy, but will act over and over again. If
we coagulate a quantity of milk, and apply the whey
to a like quantity of milk, the milk will be coagulated;
we could do this indefinitely, if it were not for
getting a larger volume of whey than we have of
milk."


Anybody tried this or is this old news?

That's an extreme no-no in my cheesemake.  I do everything possible to not reintroduce old whey into new cheese

I have some recipes I have translated from Italy that re-use yesterdays whey in todays cheese milk. As I rarely have the time to make cheese two days in a row I have not tested these so you have not seen them. I don't feel comfortable holding whey for a week and trying it and I am not sure what freezing would do to the process.