Cheese Making

For all of our budding cheesemakers! this is a fab blog.

Cheddar

Ingredients:

• 10 litres Gold Top Jersey whole milk
• 5ml vegetarian rennet
• DVI starter

Gold Top milk

Heating milk

Heat milk to 21C, add the DVI starter, and leave for 45 minutes.
Heat to 30C and add rennet diluted in plenty of boiled and cooled water.

Cutting the curd

Leave for around an hour until curd is ready, then cut into 1cm slices.

Scalded curd

Heat to 40C over the course of 45 minutes, stirring gently by hand.

Draining the curd

Drain the curd using cheesecloth or muslin, and leave to consolidate into a single mass.

Further draining

Once the majority of the whey has drained from the curd, place on a tray and leave to rest for half an hour.

Consolidated curd

Sliced consolidated curd

Curd stacking

Slice the consolidated curd into strips about a centimetre thick, and place on top of each other in cheesecloth and leave to drain for 15 minutes.
Re-stack the slices with the inner slices becoming the outer, and leave for another 15 minutes.

Gas holes after stacking

This stacking is to allow gas inside the curd to escape, as well as draining more whey from the curd.

Milling the curd

Slice the curd into small pieces and mix in some salt.

Packing the curd

Pack the curd into a cheesecloth-lined mould, and press lightly (around 7kg) for 1 hour.

After pressing

Increase pressure to around 14kg and leave for 24 hours.

After a hot bath

Dip in hot water at 66C for a minute to smooth the rind, then allow to dry at room temperature.
Wrap loosely in muslin and place in a cool (8-10C) dry place, and turn daily for 3+ months.
Still got over a month to wait to taste this one, but the smell is amazing already!

Source: http://handyface.wordpress.com/