Anybody make their own cheeses? I'm looking at buying a kit (i prefer the cheddars) and then smoking some of the end product. Got some $$ to spend at Amazon and the kits have caught my eye.
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Thanks Jerod Broussard for the plug. It was dang tasty too! I look forward to Willy reply cheese making is sill something I find interesting. -
Oh Wow I went back and watched this again. In my defense I had just started making Videos and wasn't so good at bending time. Stuff that should have been ready before recording wasn't my bad...
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I do, but I don't have time to reply more tonight. I'd love to get a cheese discussion going.Comment
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SlushDeezey I to wanted to get into cheese making. Ran into a a small problem I didn't have a place to age the cheese. Turns out a wine cooler is almost perfect but they were 300 bucks!! so I gave up. cheddars can age as little as 30 days, But I was wanting to do parmesan cheese they need around 9 months lol. still think it would be fun to do! I have a source of unpasteurized whole milk here in West Texas.Comment
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I've got bits and pieces and desire, but no time! Beer brewing, smoking, work, 8-kids and one granddaughter. Man I'd love to do cheese at least once, though.Comment
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I have made cheese several times, usually soft (quick) cheeses like mascarpone and ricotta. I make yogurt frequently. I did make a really tasty cheddar (aged six months) and will be making another soon. I made a not-so good mozzarella once. I have access to raw milk, which is claimed to be important for aged cheeses like cheddar.
The book I have is generally easy to use; it’s â€Home Cheese Making†by Ricki Carrollâ€. The "cheese making community" suffers from some annoying tendencies, like specifying pressure in pounds, as in: "put the cheese in a mold under 20 pounds of pressure". Really? How big is the mold? With some digging, this got resolved, but it irks me to no end. Lol I think Carroll’s book is probably the most widely used, though I haven’t read any others. No doubt, there are cheesed equivalents to AR but I haven't frequented them
I think a sous vide is a huge help as temperature control is important during the making. The SV doesn’t go into the cheese (milk and added ingredients) pot, it goes in a larger pot (or sink) filled with water that gets heated via SV and into which the cheese pot goes. Lake’s book doesn’t address the SV idea as it is older than wide spread SV use.
I already own a wine cooler, so aging at temps in the mid 50s°F is easy. A dorm fridge might be a cheap alternative, though it might require an external thermostat controller. Some home brew stores carry cheese making supplies and there are a number of online retailers. Carroll’s New England Cheese Making Supply Co. is the one I have used.
If this sounds interesting, maybe buy Carroll’s book or get it from the library and see what you think. It is fun and it’s fairly easy, but it’s more hands on than BBQ. I would be somewhat skeptical of a "kit". Do some reading before you buy so you can judge the adequacy of any particular kit
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I use a dorm fridge with a temp controller like this: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01HXM5UAC/...mazingribs1-20.
I plug the the fridge into the cool outlet and have a small ceramic heater plugged into the heat outlet.
I use this this to control beer fermentation and lagering. It should work for other fermentations.Comment
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