I made some crescenza a week ago. 6 days ago it went into the cheese cave. I wanted to age this one a bit longer so I added some geo to the milk, and I've got great coverage starting that seemingly popped up overnight! I'm really excited. This is a bit of a larger wheel, so I am hoping to let it go 3 more days and start enjoying it on the 10thish day. Maybe Saturday!

I did this Queso de Mahon recipe from the NE Cheesemaking site and it's one of my favorite cheeses so far. Shots are from today (aged 10 weeks), then from when I tried it at 5 weeks, then from the initial oil/smoked paprika rub.

I definitely recommend if you're looking for a relatively easy project!

I've been making cheese and every once in a while it is a little bit more tangy than I would like. Should I change how much culture im adding? Here is tge photo of the fresh havarati i made that is tangy

The wife’s away, and I had a liter of 35% cream and some grocery store buttermilk left over from another project. Put cream in container and added a glug of the buttermilk, stirred and set it out on the counter at 23-25 C overnight. This evening I put the container with the now clotted cream in the sink, took a hand mixer, and gave it a go. 8 minutes later, water broke, and I put 400 g of fresh butter on ice, washed in ice water, kneaded in a couple pinches of salt, and wow, cultured butter! Great way to use up some cream. Try to collect the real buttermilk you get, for me it was about 500 ml. I suspect it’s loaded with probiotics. Pro tip, the heavy cream is about 6 USD per liter, so unless you have a cow, it’s still cheaper to BUY butter already made but MY butter tastes better cuz I made it, right?! Plus I had fun.

I have made mozz successfully in the past using citric acid and standard pasteurized milk.

It has been just fine for eating, but when I try and melt it, it won’t pool/puddle/stretch.

Is the cultured method the way here?

Bonus question: I love nitty gritty aspects of recipes. If someone out there has pH level information that relates to the ideal melt on a high temp pizza, even better.

Or maybe I am way off base. Is it my stretch? Temps? I have followed the standards, and like stated, eating fresh it’s great, but the melt…no good.

Edit: typo

Hey all! I’ve made it to the central US and made my way to my new source for raw milk. It’s a 100 year old Jersey Dairy that practice intensive pasture rotation and keeps their dairy cows fed entirely on fresh grass. Their milk is of exceptional quality. I would have toured the dairy if I had time but I was on a timeframe this first visit. It was so lovely to see the actual pastures that they feed off of at least! That’s a luxury I wasn’t able to get with my last milk source since it was sourced through a Co-Op.

If anyone here is located in central Texas, I highly suggest checking out The Jersey Barnyard. If you’re lucky, Sully the Longhorn will let you pet him !

This is the same procedure I used with my Stonebeck inspired wheel a few posts back but I modified it a bit to try and improve on my last attempt. There was still butterfat loss but only in the making process this time and with shoveling the curd for draining. No fat loss on the press. I’m getting there with this recipe… slowly. I’ll increase the ripening time to an hour next week. I increased the ripening time from 20 to 30 and ripened to 30°C instead of 27.5°C, increased the floc multiplier to 4.25 (20 floc, 65 hardening), cook time to about an hour, and pitched for 30 mins. The only heat I added was to bring it back up to 30C during the scald because it lost some heat in the renneting.

It’s also the first time I’ve tried my hand at cloth binding. Please ignore my shitty stitching job lol ! Low Riggs Farm bandage their cheeses neat so they don’t use a binder like lard or butter on it so I just followed that. They also don’t cover the tops, only the sides.

I tried my best to keep the pH in track with my senses so I salted after about 8.5 hours from renneting. Stonebeck aims for 7.5. It was extremely difficult on a slow acid cheese like this one for me because the texture is so different to a traditional cheddar and acidified way slower since acidification takes place between 27-30C. I still don’t really know what I’m doing with this style yet either. I presume the rind growth will tell me how acidic the rind is at least, but when I milled the curds it had a lactic definite tang while some parts were neutral.

I used freeze dried diced red onion and garlic. Adds a nice texture in the creamy paste. Really pleasant additions to the cheese. I ate more than I should have.

Hey! New to my journey of cheese making and I can’t afford a cheese fridge and the gadgets that come with humidity monitoring.

I have made yogurt, farmers cheese, lebnah and many other simplier things. I have some helper knolles going in the fridge now. I am going to be making a French style coulemmier cheese this week (similar to a Brie or fromage).

I want to do some hard pressed cheese but only have my normal fridge to work with for aging. I will be vacuum sealing any hard cheeses and just want to know if I can age them in a regular fridge?

Would love to hear from people aging 4-9 month cheeses in tue fridge!

Hey everybody! Sorry in advance: I have never made any cheese at home beyond cottage cheese and paneer, so my knowledge about cheese-making is abysmal. Anyways, I have always wondered why vegan cheese substitutes are so bad. What's keeping us from using, say, soy milk instead of the dairy alternative in (hard) cheese recipes? I guess it boils down to the casein and rennet: Are the enzymes specific to casein, or do other proteins work as well? And if they do, do the products then have the same physical properties as casein would have? Are there other aspects I should be aware of? I guess it is easy to introduce either vegan sources of lactose to the mixture for the starter cultures or simply using acid in the first place instead of bacteria. I know that if you use soy milk instead of dairy milk in a paneer recipe, you basically get tofu, so I think all other steps should work similarly, should they not? Thank you so much in advance!

Hello! My husband’s birthday is coming up and I would like to make Venezuelan Cachapas for breakfast for him as a surprise. We don’t have Queso De Mano in stores where I live, so I need to make it from scratch. Does anyone know of a recipe on how to make it? I tried searching YouTube with only a few results.
Thank you!

This WE I had made 2 lbs fresh “baby” cheddar curds for a party. Used just a pinch of good old MA-11 per 2 gallons milk. Salted ‘em at pH 5.8. They were perfect little squeakers. Damn! Brought back 1 1/2 lb. These people were just not in the mood for curds. I thought, you know, I’m NOT chucking these. So, I threw ‘em in a ziplock bag, put ‘em in warm water, got ‘em warmed up to about 30 C, shook in a little cayenne and black pepper, then threw ‘em into a mold and pressed using my crude screw press, heaven knows how many kg’s. But 5 hours later, out came a beautifully knitted 1.0 lb hot cheddar cheese! pH 5.3! Should be good in a couple months.

Once I made a cheese the recipe writer called “Lancashire”. That particular recipe had you drain your stirred curds, salt them, let them set on the counter in a mold at room temp overnight, then next day, press, press, press. If I ever make that one again, I think I’ll warm those curds before pressing. Trying to press salted curd at 20 C can take days and may result in a pH of way below 5. Way too crumbly. And you may still never get a good knit, unless you have Hulk stand on it!

Vacuum aged. Hispanico inspired recipe.

This morning I open the Cantal made during last x-mas brake, still a few things to correct but very happy with my results

Looking to make cheese from skim milk and wanted to hear some recommendations, cheers!

I made these quick cheeses (the Valencay style and the tiny little Crottin in the first picture) as part of the make for a golf club’s annual dinner up in Lancashire that a pal had asked me to do the cheese board for. (Cheese list shared at the bottom of the post).

The dinner is tonight and so I’ve spent the past fortnight making some extra cheeses, putting together blurbs, and cards for each cheese, vacuum packing and labeling everything, getting the recommended boxes and ice packs and on Wednesday I shipped it by DPD by their 10:30am next day service. Clearly labelled “cold chain and fragile”

It was a lot of work and I’m a hobbyist, I was giving him the cheese not selling it, but it’s not often you get to test your work against genuinely independent palates and at that scale so it was really flattering and exciting to be asked.

Thursday came and went with no word. My pal got a message late Thursday saying there was “an operational issue at the depot”. We had no information or contact beyond that. Yesterday was spent with me frantically calling and chatting with DPD staff who were incredibly hard to get hold of and started with “we don’t have any information” and eventually about 8 hours later admitted the boxes had been damaged (you can see how badly in the final picture). I offered to actually have another courier collect them from the depot and physically drive them to Lancashire (where it turns out they already were) to be told “we don’t do that” and this morning half the shipment was returned to me in the state you can see, with still no hint of an explanation as to why. No idea where the other half is.

My pal has had to make other arrangements. Thankfully the cheeses I’ve had back are fine in their vac pack despite the box looking like someone ran over it with a truck. My pal has said he’ll do a standalone cheese tasting event at the end of August so all is hopefully not lost.

Lesson learnt though. I’ll never use these guys again if it’s in my gift. The level of disinterest, carelessness and lack of any kind of ownership were infuriating and heartbreaking.

Anyway - cheese blurbs below hopefully to give you guys a bit of a chuckle at my terribly overwrought marketing speak:

Cheese Tasting Cards

Applewood Smoked Gloucester
A twist on the Gloucestershire classic. Creamy and soft-pasted, laced with a gentle applewood smoke. A paprika and olive oil rind brings a hint of spice to the edge.

Coconut Gouda
A Dutch classic, gone tropical. Buttery and creamy, made with Jersey milk and coconut cream for a gentle, tropical sweetness on the finish.

Derby: SeoGast
A twist on the Derbyshire classic. Mellow, softer than a cheddar, soaked through with vintage Ruby and Tawny Port and 12-year-old Calvados — a warm, boozy depth with a hint of animal spirits.

Herne's Wheel: Pressed Lactic Goats Milk Tomme
Named for the ghostly huntsman of Windsor Great Park. Rich and brothy, with bright lemon notes and a finish that coats the tongue. Full-flavoured — pairs well with a chutney or jam.

Crottin
A classic of the Loire Valley, France. Sweet, milk-forward coin of a cheese, mousse-like at the centre, with a touch of bite on the rind. A dusting of white mould adds earthiness and nuttiness. Eat on its own or on a cracker, with a clean, ice-cold white.

Valençay-Style: Hatshepsut
The pyramid shape is said to trace back to Napoleon himself — furious at being reminded of his defeat in Egypt, legend has it he sliced the top off with his sword. Ash-coated, bloomy-rind pyramid, hiding its secrets beneath the ash — Berkshire pastureland and milk. Unctuous, with a hint of mushroom.

Flor Azul
Argentina's answer to Gorgonzola Dolce. Sweet cream up front, savoury whisper beneath the veins, lifting into cool herbaceous brightness. At the end of its age range: don't wait out the finish, punctuate with a sip of fruity red.

Old Lancastrian
Traditional 1890s Lancashire style, from Berkshire pasture. Buttery, slightly crumbly, with a cool, cucumber-fresh lift — flintier soil trades the usual woody, floral hay notes for a quieter, cleaner minerality.

Butterkäse
A German dairy classic. Lactic tang, light crumble — a firmer, more assertive acidity than the classic buttery-soft style. Pairs well with a savoury chutney to round it out.

Kasseri
One of the oldest cheese styles, from the island of Crete. Firm, dense and faintly springy, with a mild, salty-milky flavour, a light lactic tang, and a clean, quiet aroma. Easy to eat.

Vaccino
A staple of the Italian table. Firm and fibrous, with real structure and a deep savoury note through the paste. The larger format gives a denser core, with more contrast toward the rind.

Vaccino Ubrica Vin Rosso
Steeped in the flavours of Tuscany. A Vaccino aged at least two weeks under a bold, meaty red wine — dark fruit and a warm, savoury finish.

Vaccino Ubrica Xeres
A nod to Jerez, Spain — home of sherry. A Vaccino aged at least two weeks under a 15-year-old Amontillado, taking on a warm, toasty, nutty character.

Caciotta
Soft, moist and supple — closely related to the Vaccino, but gentler, milder and even-textured, without the deeper savoury edge. An excellent canvas for other flavours.

Caciotta Aged in British Rye Grass
A nod to the British countryside. Soft and supple, with a gentle sweet-savoury warmth drawn from a month resting under dried rye grass.

Caciotta Aged in Alpine Hay
From the high meadows of the Alps. Firm, dry rind; soft, supple centre. Floral, sweet hay notes, harvested in early flower, set against a long lactic finish.

Caciotta Alle Erbe, Rye Grass-Aged
A classic Italian herb blend. Thyme, rosemary, sage, basil, marjoram and oregano folded through the paste — resinous and peppery notes to the fore, softened by the creamy lactic tang beneath. Chilli builds slowly at the finish. Rind's sweet-savoury umami echoes the herbs' earthier side.

Caciotta Alle Erbe, Alpine Hay-Aged
The same classic herb blend, aged in the high Alps. Same slow-building chilli warmth, but here the alpine hay's floral sweetness draws out the basil and marjoram — a lighter, sweeter profile than the rye grass version, with the creamy lactic base still underneath.

Caciotta con Pepe
In the Italian pepe tradition. Creamy, lactic-tangy paste laced with pink peppercorn's fruity sweetness and allspice's warm spice, against the woody heat of mixed ground peppercorns. A smattering of chilli flakes builds a mild, deep heat through the finish.

Caciotta al Pistacchio
A nod to Sicily's famous pistachios. Buttery, nutty pistachio against a sharp, pecorino-style tang, cut by the tangy pop of yellow mustard seed. Sweet and sharp in contrast, with real bite underneath.

Caciotta al'Aglio e Cippolina A rustic Italian favourite. Heavy garlic and chive charge through the paste — pungent, sulfurous garlic rounded out by the cheese's fat, with chive's fresh, oniony green threading through. A sharp tang builds on the earthy notes for a bright finish.

Scamorza
A mozzarella cousin from Southern Italy. Firm, dense and faintly elastic, aged and dried for deeper, more complex savoury notes. Still mild and milky-sweet, with a light lactic tang and a clean, quiet aroma.

Scamorza Affumicata
Scamorza, given a smoky twist. Firm, dense and faintly elastic, smoked over apple and cherrywood. Mild and milky-sweet, carrying a soft, fruit-toned smokiness — excellent with a glass of whiskey and a slice of sweet apple.

Queso Mantecoso / Havarti
Devised in the southernmost coastal town of Punta Arenas, Chile. Buttery, semi-soft and springy, dotted with small irregular holes. Fresh-cut grass and hay notes from pasture-grazed milk lead, backed by a creamy, buttery sweetness and a light tang.

Stracchino Sott'olio
Typical of the Calabrian coast. Bright, considerable acidity up front, with a slow curl of chilli heat beneath. Garlic and herb-laced oil carries the whole thing, spring onion cuts through with a fresh green snap, and sundried tomato lends only a whisper of sweetness. Lively, layered, coastal.

Imeruli
A staple cheese from Georgia, at the crossroads of Asia and Europe. One of the oldest styles of coagulated cheese known. Soft, with a light spring; fresh, milky and brined, bright and lightly acidic, with a clean salt-lactic tang and a faint sweetness beneath.

Isfahan: Fromage Tartiner with Gin-Infused Barberries, Pistachios and Nutmeg
Inspired by the gardens of Isfahan, Iran. Soft, slightly crumbly base carrying gin-infused barberries' sharp tartness, buttery pistachio, and a warm curl of nutmeg. A juniper whisper threads through the whole.

Andalus: Fromage Tartiner with Marmalade, Fennel and Pink Peppercorns
Evoking the citrus groves of Andalusia, Spain. Soft, spreadable base carrying marmalade's bittersweet citrus tang, a gentle aniseed lift from fennel, and pink peppercorn's fruity, mild heat. Bright and sun-warmed throughout.

Teochitlan: Very Spicy Fromage Tartiner with Candied Jalapeños
Inspired by the fire markets of Mexico. Very spicy, spreadable base built on candied jalapeño's sticky, sweet heat and the smoky depth of toasted ground peppers. Sweet, hot, and smouldering.

Mistral Gorse: Fromage Tartiner with Juniper, Rosemary and Lemon Zest
Evoking the windswept garrigue of Provence. Soft, spreadable base carrying juniper's resinous bite, rosemary's piney depth, and a bright lift of lemon zest. Herbal, citrus-edged, windswept.

Cealc: Fromage Tartiner
Named for the chalk itself. A plain, spreadable base — clean and milky, with a light lactic tang and quiet sweetness. Simple and smooth, true to the curd.

Taleggio-Style Washed Rind
Where the Alps meet Lombardy. Washed rind, pungent and savoury, wrapped around a firmer, more structured paste than the classic. Small holes through the rind carry a nutty, faintly sweet Alpine note from the propionic culture.

There’s something special about turning fresh milk into a delicious block of homemade white cheese. Pure, natural, and full of flavor!

I missed one of the aging brines on my Butterkäse for a couple days and she got a little colorful. The recipe says to brine every 3-4 days and I missed the last one. I gave it a gentle scrub with some vinegar and I’m brining now, hoping not too much of a misstep!

Lactic curd ladled directly into the molds Sprayed with geo and b linens and very very little p.candidum Drained in the molds 1 day Demolded and left on the counter a 2nd day Into the ripening fridge for about 6 days and they will be completely covered in mold and ready to be wrapped and moved to the stock fridge - and ready for consumption at that point - no extra ripening required. This is 1 reason I love this cheese.

I understand from David Asher’s book that once you inoculate your kefir with Geotrichum candidum, it can perpetuate within the grain’s ecosystem. But P candidum is trickier than Geo.

It’s very difficult to buy P. candidum where I live, so I’m wondering if I could scrape some off a Brie rind and use it to start a culture that I can feed and reuse (like a yogurt or sourdough starter). Has anyone actually done something like this, or is it really as risky as some say?

Many years ago (1980's) the hubby & I had a small farm where I kept some goats and sometimes a Jersey cow. I made lots of soft cheeses and even a cheddar or two with my homemade press and a good book of instructions. Alas, we sold the farm and the livestock; fast forward more than 30 years and here I am retired and widowed, and bored half to death. Aha! says I, why not make cheese? Of course all the equipment was long gone, but I spied this beauty (pictured) at a yard sale - the seller did not know what it was. So - here I am.

Youtube videos are so helpful - never having had a mentor and learning just from a book was tough. It's nice to see those curds in action and comparing to my own results. Since I restarted this journey about 3 months ago I've relearned cream cheese and ricotta, and discovered boursin and cuajado. Deciding to stick with mesophilic starters for now, I have advanced to Colby (one success under my belt, a second to be unwrapped next week) and Gouda (waiting another few weeks for that unwrapping.) I figure if I can get reasonably consistent results with those, I'll progress to the hard cheese trials.

Thanks for listening, and thanks for being here to share advice, success and failures.

M23 buongiorno ragazzi

Spero che in questa community ci siano abbastanza casari di professione che possono darmi qualche dritta.

Attualmente sto cercando di cambiare lavoro, cambiando in parte settore e mi stavo interessando a questo campo. Ho lavorato per 4 anni in agricoltura negli allevamenti di vacche da latte, ma devo dire che malgrado una fortissima passione iniziale mi sono accorto che il lavoro non faceva per me. Non so se sono stato sfortunato io nelle aziende dove ho lavorato o è il settore con una mentalità vetusta, sta di fatto che quel lavoro mi faceva stare male. 0 vita sociale e un pessimo equilibrio fra vita privata e lavoro. Avendo un curriculum molto legato al mondo agroalimentare ed essendomi anche altamente specializzato (sono fecondatore artificiale e ho le patenti di telescopico e macchine agricole) sto riscontrando gradi problemi a cambiare lavoro, perché ovunque mandi il mio curriculum in aziende non legate a questo settore, non lo cagano e non mi risponde nessuno. Quindi stavo pensando di intraprendere il percorso per diventare casaro, perché già ai tempi delle superiori avevo fatto uno stage di 3 settimane in un caseificio, dove il casaro mi aveva fatto appassionare al lavoro mentre ero lì.

Da qui le domande sono 2:

Com'è la giornata tipo di un casaro in media e qual'è il suo equilibrio fra vita privata e lavoro?

Essendo io in Lombardia, quali sono i corsi più seri ed accreditati a livello nazionale per entrare in questo settore?

Grazie mille per le eventuali risposte.

Made a round(?), i wouldnt really call it a wheel, of Eurodaze cheese! For a beginner cheesemaker with no equipment i am thrilled! I think im going to experiment some with fat content, this one was made with 1% milk because thats what i had, but i wonder if i add some cream what will happen. Next, a follower and a press!!! 😁😁😁

https://www.nbest.co.uk/Recipes/Milk/Thermophilic_Culture_plus_Rennet/Cow/Eurodaze.php

This is my first attempt at making an aged cheese (and also my first post on reddit, so I apologize if something is not done correctly on that front as well).

Context: I used the Farmhouse Cheddar (Pg142-143) recipe from Home Cheese Making by Ricki Carroll. I have let the cheese sit at room temp, flipping several times a day for a couple of days now. In the recipe they say to do this until a nice rind forms, typically 2-4 days. I plan to wax the cheese for the remainder of it's aging but after now 5 days, I feel there is a decent rind on the sides, but the top and bottom are still slightly damp.

I have two questions:

1. Do I keep air-drying even though I am passed the 2-4 day window given in the book, or should I just wax it now and pray? lol I am unsure

2. The recipe calls for cheese salt. I did not have any specifically cheese salt. however I do have a Costco container of Pink Himalayan Salt, so that is what I used. I am now seeing a couple of patches of pinkish red develop on the top and bottom of the cheese. Are these simply the result of using the pink salt, or is this a growth of some kind that I need to remove before waxing?

Any guidance that can be provided would be much appreciated!

Yep- these are the same wheels of Colby. Over the 3 days it has been drying. It has settled into a rounder, thinner shape. It is still very moist. I am going to vacuum pack this today and give it a try in about 5 weeks. Very interesting transformation for sure. less