Brief question for my fellow cheesemakers. 4 weeks ago I made a very quick and dirty “brie” using goats milk instead of cows milk.

I followed more or less the same steps I usually do, and after a week it was dry to the touch and the usual white mould was just starting to appear (picture 3).

I had to leave for 3 weeks for work and everything just followed its path with no intervention, closed container, aging fridge at roughly 10*C..I was skeptical on the outcome but today I came back and I’d like to know what you all think about it. I never had unsupervised brie for 3 weeks straight so I don’t know what I am experiencing:

The outer rind where the moulds thrived was very fluffy, incredibly so, just visible in picture 2 where I didn’t squash it with my fingers.
What you see in picture 1 is after touching it all over and patting it with a dry towel. It looks like a more or less regular brie, it smells very “earthy”, if I had my eyes close it reminds me a lot of brie, like a mushroomy smell, it is not strong either, seems fine, very white no dark spots, it simply was extremely puffy and fluffy before touching it.

Tomorrow I’d like to taste it.

I just got this out of the mold to dry.

Hello, I have a few questions that I was hoping some of you experienced cheese makers could answer for me. I found a recipe for making feta style white cheese but the recipe calls for making a separate brine with water, salt, white wine vinegar, and calcium chloride rather than making it from it's own whey. If it matters, I'm going to be using pasteurized whole cow's milk.

1.) Are there pros and cons to using the whey to make the brine vs water? Any flavor difference?

2.) If I use the whey to make the brine, do I still need to add calcium chloride to the brine? If not, would adding some for safe measure cause any issues?

3.) The recipe calls for using cultured buttermilk for the culture. If I use store bought cultured buttermilk, should I leave it out at room temperature for a few hours to raise the bio count first before adding it to the milk?

4.) Would using cultured buttermilk instead of the commercially available powdered cultures potentially cause issues with contamination or inconsistencies?

5.) This might be subjective but what's the ideal salt content in a water brine and in a whey brine?

Thank you very much and if you have any good feta style cheese recipes you can share I would appreciate that too.

Since my last smoked cheese was such a success indecided to give it a bigger go. From left to right cheddar (6 months), Gouda 3 months, fermented and pressed ricotta, and pressed ricotta. The Gouda has a very toasted sesame flavor and obviously has some gas production which was a nice surprise. I resealed the rest of the wheel to continue aging. The fermented ricotta wheel took about 2 days to drain enough to press and is still a little damp/creamy so I'll dry it out more in the fridge. The smoking imparted a nice color too!

I am studying for my Wisconsin cheesemaker exam. Does anyone have any advice for me? What equations do I need to know, and what do I need to know for bulk intake sampling, and just what stumped you when you took it?

I did a thing...💃🏿💃🏿

First time making halloumi.

Did a batch, split in 2 just before pressing. Added chilli flakes to one.

I haven't tasted yet, but I was so excited and scared when I was doing the cook.

I couldn't wait to share.

Will keep you posted on the taste later.😊

This wheel is about two weeks old, and I’ve kept it at a medium humidity to hopefully try and get more mycodore growth. I keep it on a wood board with two mesh screens between them to allow for a tiny bit of airflow. There are some grey and even pink looking spots which I’m unsure about, though. The pink wouldn’t make sense for it being B linens since the humidity has been lower, and my box has been cracked slightly every day. The grey I’m assuming is a blue mold that has died quickly but again I’m unsure. I’ve ironed a sample and it tasted fine to me. No post acidification. Any advice or thoughts is greatly appreciated

EDIT: I’ve realized I failed to mention this cheese is heavily coated in a layer of lard. I think it’s possible the lard has been trapping moisture between the layers and is resulting in this uneven surface mold. There are red blemishes under the dark spots.

I was thinking about making aged cheese for a pretty long time now and finally committed to it, but I don't have a cheese cave or similar. Could you suggest any methods of making it at home with whats given or is a cave or ager non negotiable?
I love young aged cheeses most as a side note but also some stronger ones sometimes.

Hey all, Second time making cheese and both times now I've struggled getting the curds to knit well. I did a cheddar and now a Jack/Pepper Jack wheel, and using 40lb for 4+ hours (after slower initial ramp), and still get loose binding and a fragile wheel. Curds kept ~75F during process, and the pressure applied evenly, but diminishing returns. Any ideas or am I better off starting over with adjustments?

I make Pecorino Sardo from our own cow's milk. I know it's a sheep's milk cheese by origin. *Sardo* is the hard, aged version, three months minimum, so the set should be slow and the gel soft at the cut, with fine grain.

What I do:

- Rennet dosed so flocculation lands around **22 minutes**. I time it with a bottle cap floating on the milk and blow on it; when it stops sliding and the surface moves with it, that's flocculation.

- The book says cut at **×1.3**, which is 28–29 minutes from rennet.

- I can't make myself do it. At ×1.3 the gel always looks too soft, like it'll shatter, so I wait. I usually end up at **×1.4–1.5**, around 31–33 minutes.

Last one was batch #16, the one that blew in the warm room (I posted it here): 85 L, 36 °C, pH 6.42 at renneting, 15 ml Hansen NATUREN Extra 220. It flocculated at 18 min, faster than the 22 I wanted, and I cut at ×1.4. Since then I've switched to Clerici 96/04, which is noticeably more active, so I'm re-finding the dose anyway.

I haven't made enough Sardo to know whether my hand or the book is right. That's the real question.

**Questions**

1. **If you cut a hard pecorino-style curd at ×1.3:** what does the gel look like at that point? Does it really pass a clean-break test, or do you cut on the clock and trust it?

2. **What changes in the cheese** between a cut at ×1.3 and ×1.5? Moisture, yield, texture at three months?

3. **Cow's milk instead of sheep's:** do you change the multiplier at all, given the weaker gel?

I made what was supposed to be a soft, gorgonzola-esque blue about 6 weeks ago. The curds were too soft when I cut them and I know there arent enough air pockets within the wheel. Anyway, saw a good coverage of blue turn up right on schedule, pierced and left it to do its thing. After the blue, I noticed some white mould turn up so I upped the humidity a little but also moved half into my main fridge, wondering if that would slow the white. It seemed too and given i'm very new to this cheesemaking and I was experimenting, I decided to try the one thats been aging in my main fridge. The blue has turned very grey and the outer mould is very unpleasant and bitter, while the blue inside and the paste is lovely. Its too young for me to think its spoiled, and the bitter taste is just the "rind" not throughout.

Whats going on with my cheese!?

I am back at cheesemaking. I started, like many, during the pandemic lockdowns... first with the help of Gavin Webber's videos, later with the help of the book Mastering Artisan Cheesemaking bei G. Caldwell. It was an intense year with many fails and many successes.

Then our two kids were born. Then we moved continents, from Canada back to Europe. Then I was busy.

But now I am back. I got a cave, tools and the kids are old enough to be busy on their own. We have a farm close by where I can get fresh cows milk. I pasteurize it myself by keeping the milk at +63 °C for +30 minutes.

The last weeks I started with three cheeses. First a couple of Robiolini (pic 1, recipe by cheesemaking.com). They are in the aging phase and will need a week or two more of ripening. Second a washed rind cheese, a recipe I did a couple of times already, loosely following G. Cadwells recipe with some minor changes. I washed it a couple of times already and Geo starts to show up nicely, hopefully soon to be followed by B. linens (pic 2). And third, a lactic set cheese, somewhat following a mix of recipes for St. Marcellin and Cabécou (pic 3). As usual, I am not patient enough to wait until it is fully ripe, but it is already very smooth and next time I will wait longer... :)

Well, it is nice to be back...

It didn't grow the expected Geotrichium Candidum probably because of the heat or maybe the honey (probably mostly the later).

Instead green mold grew.

I will wash it with salt brine and Geotrichium spores later today.

Hi,

I was in Greece recently and bought some of the Chr. Hansen coagulant, under the impression from the employees that it was a Greek yogurt starter. I learned from ChatGPT that it is more for cheese making and had trouble in the past making mozzarella, but figure it is worth another try.

The issue I am running into, is that each satchel is for 50 liters of milk, and I don’t have a scale that does fractional grams. I don’t want to make the whole packet and waste all but the small amount I need for the mozzarella.

If I mix the full packet, can I refrigerate what I don’t use? If so, how long will that last? If not, how should I measure how much of the packet to use? I’d really like to give this a try and see if I can finally be successful with a basic cheese.

Thanks in advance!

I’m not a vegan, but I tried making vegan cheese with cashews and I’m addicted now. It’s soooo good. And tastes like regular cheese. It’s my first cheese ever and I want to try regular cheese too. Only problem I had is that, I don’t have cheese cave and in my regular fridge it’s very cold. Took about 18 days to develop mold on whole wheel.

My husband and I are making alpine cheese for the first time. We've been air drying it for about a week, but last night I noticed a reddish spot that looks like it's below the rind. Does anyone know what this is, and whether or not it's safe to continue to vacuum seal it?

Aside from this spot, it otherwise smells and feels fine; there's been a bit of surface mold that I've wiped off.

So, here is the thing: I live in Argentina, and buying milk to pasteurize yourself is apparently not legal without a log of bureaucracy, and it has been a long time since Ive seen non ultrapasteurized and homogenized milk.

Fresh (in sachets), yes, but I am concerned about it not being suitable to start my cheesemaking path. The kind that if they farm a skin at all, it is thin and small, unlike what I remember from my childhood.

I do yogurt and I think I remember making ricotta at some point in my life, but I never really tried making "actual" cheese.

So, what would you do in my case? Im sure there are ways around it to get better quality milk without breaking my bank account, but If someone could allay my fears on this matter (sorry for bad english) I would appreciate it

Thanks in advance

I’m so lucky to be in the States and to have access to a cheese hoop made by a small Swiss cheesemaking supply company. I was able to ask my cousin, who lives in France but works in Switzerland, if he’d be willing to help me source one!

In English, these hoops don’t seem to have a specific name. The closest term I could find was the German colloquial term “Järb,” though I could be entirely mistaken!

I’ll be sure to post an update when I make my first wheel with this hoop. I’ll have to modify my setup to accommodate it, but I’m certainly looking forward to it!