I’m completely willing to make cheese for friends that ask nicely! Send me an email if you’re interested and we’ll discuss more 🙂
Cheesemaking Photos
Left to right: calcium chloride, citric acid, red pepper flakes. A rennet tablet has been dissolved in the white bowl.
Queso fresco that has been pressed for 1 hour
Cheese under 40 pounds of pressure. The weight pushes whey out of the cheese, making the final cheese both dryer and firmer.
Gouda has been waxed and will age at least 3 months before we can eat it.
DON’T drop the cheese into the wax.
Before adding rennet the plastic container will glide across the milk easily. After adding rennet the milk will coagulate and the container will appear to get “stuck”. The time it takes to get “stuck” is used to calculate how long the milk needs in order to completely coagulate.
Cheddar “slabs” stacked, but not criss-crossed.
Dip cheese into melted wax then put on wax paper to dry. Repeat until entire cheese is waxed, using the paintbrush to seal in any gaps.
Slabs are stacked on top of each other, doubling their height. They are flipped over every 15 minutes for the next 90 minutes.
Wax is sold as a big, solid brick.
Milk with annatto coloring added.
A wheel of Farmhouse Cheddar air drying under a piece of cheesecloth. This cheese will be flipped twice a day until a yellowish rind develops on the edges.
Tomatoes wrapped with dill mozzarella.
Mozzarella with red pepper flakes added.
Pour yogurt into cheesecloth.
Queso fresco curds right before pressing.
8 quart and 20 quart double boilers.
Curds in the mold.
Queso fresco will be pressed under 30 pounds of weight for 6 hours.
Cheddar cheese curds before pressing.
Cheddar cheese that has been air dried for about 24 hours.
Ready for waxing!
Chemicals used for queso fresco (7/3/2014) Shot glasses (left to right): calcium chloride, mesophyllic starter, lipase powder Bowls (left to right): rennet solution, cheese salt
Yogurt cream cheese.
Layering strips in the cheese pot. Learn from my mistake: DON’T CROSS THE STRIPS.
Hang cheesecloth to drain.
Cheese can now be stored in the refrigerator for up to 3 months.
Cheese curds have formed!
Mozzarella with sun dried tomatoes, garlic, and truffle salt
Rounded gouda (left) next to a flat bottomed cheddar (right)
Wax has a low melting point and is very flammable. Always melt it using a double boiler setup.
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- Asiago Pepato (Part 2) (7/11/2016) – I was asked to make a few cheeses for a wedding coming up in October. Here is the first cheese, an Asiago Pepato. I started with a two gallon batch for practice, and to work out any bugs in my process. Then I scaled up the recipe to make a 4 gallon batch. The smaller […]
- Asiago Pepato (1/26/2016) – Asiago cheese with peppercorns in the middle. I’ll probably only age it for 2 months because I’m curious how it tastes! Written by: Anna on January 26, 2016.
- Chocolate Chip Cheesecake (11/29/2015) – I’ve been wanting to post about cheesecake for several months now, and what better time than just after Thanksgiving? Rather than just posting pictures with a brief description, this post will walk you through my cheesecake recipe step-by-step. It takes several days to make a cheesecake, so I recommend planning ahead. Several of these steps […]
- Shaping Gouda (7/9/2015) – If you have ever purchased a wedge of Gouda, then you may have noticed that the cheese tends to have a smooth, round curve on one end. Standard cheese molds make flat, pill-tablet shaped cheeses with a corner and not a round edge. I’ve heard there are tricks you can use to simulate a bowl-shaped […]
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