Recently, one of you commented that the Kosher Coarse salt I use in my cheesemaking contains an anticaking agent. Perhaps that agent was impacting my final cheeses? Right away, of course, I checked my ingredient list and, sure enough, the ingredients included an anticaking agent! I was miffed. Salt was supposed to be salt! What the heck….
A couple weeks ago, my husband and I taught a cheesemaking class for our local Folk School, a non formal “school” which offers classes on all manner of practical subjects. The school is just starting up in our area, and our Introduction to Cheesemaking class was the first one on the docket. We’ve taught a…
I’ve opened a bunch of new cheeses in recent weeks, so how about a little show and tell? (Some of these will be featured in upcoming YouTube videos, but I decided you Splashed! folks deserve a sneak peak.) Pink GoudaIn an “oh-why-the-heck-not” moment, I decided to add a bunch of crushed pink peppercorns to a…
A couple weeks ago in a community poll (now under “posts” on my youtube page), I wrote, “Raw and pasteurized milk are equally nutritious.” Out of 200-plus responses, 12% said that statement was true, 73% said it was false, and 15% said they had no idea. My off-the-cuff impression was that fresh, untreated milk was…
When I first started making cheese, I was thrilled to discover a couple cheesemaking facebook groups where thousands of people gathered to ask questions, show off homemade cheeses, and share advice. I thought it was wonderful. I mean, it was wonderful . . . until it wasn’t. Unfortunately, some of those groups turned out to be – how…
Last week I had to be at work early, so I left instructions for my husband to dump the 8 gallons of fresh milk into the cheese pot along with a pint of clabber. It’d get an extra long acidification, but I’d be home early afternoon and would turn it into some sort of cheese then….
In Mastering Artisan Cheesemaking, Gianaclis Caldwell hammers home the importance of properly cleaning cheesemaking equipment in order to prevent milkstone, the calcium deposit that will, she warned, eventually build up on your cheesemaking equipment. But I ignored her. Hot water and soap was all I used and it seemed to do the job just fine. That…
When we had a stretch of cool and rainy days last week, I decided I’d better smoke some cheeses before summer hit. The pellet-smoker tube lasted for 4 hours (I used hickory pellets), and I turned the cheeses once partway through: a half Manchego, a half Dragon’s Milk, a wedge of ale cheddar, and two Goudas. The sixty-degree day…
A few weeks ago, YouTube follwer Robert Samuelson sent me a handmade light-weight Dutch press. If you like it, great, he said, and if not, pass it on to someone else. Well, let me tell you, this cheese press isn’t going anywhere. This slender beauty has super pressure power (check out this video he did to test just how much weight the press could…
Making butter is a real chore. Hand cranking is for the birds, and a blender is slow going (the blender turns cream into butter in 5 minutes or less, but it requires constant tending, multiple batches, and is brutally loud), so for a couple years now, I’ve been pestering my husband to fashion me a…
