Needs formatting help.

I’m copying this list of common cheese defects from a post on the discussion forum. I don’t know the original source, but thank Neil for the content.

Common Cheese Defects

Body In the context of modern sensory analysis body refers to texture, which is confusing because cheese graders use the term ‘texture’ to refer to cheese openness. Here, we will use the traditional cheese grading terms. Some descriptors for body defects are:

Crumbly/short: often due to excess salt or acid
Corky: due to overcooking, low fat, low moisture, or excess salt.
Mealy: this defect can be detected on the palate or by massaging the cheese between the thumb and forefinger. It is usually associated with excess acidity.
Pasty: sticks to the palate and fingers; due to excess moisture.
Weak: breaks down too quickly when worked by hand; due excess fat or moisture.

Texture relates to openness in the cheese which may or may not be desirable depending on the type of cheese and the cause of openness. Openness can be due to:

* Mechanical openings which are holes of irregular shape caused by trapped whey. Trapped whey makes the impression in the cheese during pressing, but during ripening the moisture is dispersed through out the cheese leaving the hole behind. Openness is desirable in Colby, but is considered a defect in Cheddar. Mechanical openings can lead to discolouration around the opening due to local acid development. Usually mechanical openings are closed by vacuum packaging.
* Gas holes are, of course, desirable in many types of cheese. Gas hole defects include:
o Early gas defects due to coliforms. These appear as small, sphericle, shiny holes. The defect is often associated with unclean flavour.
o Late gas due to Clostridium. tyrobutryricum or perfringens, especially in some European made cheese. Clostridia spores are often present in American cheese as well but do not normally cause problems. However, they may be activated by the heat treatment and, therefore, sometimes cause gas defect in processed cheese.
o A third gas defect occurs in Cheddar and American types. The defect is distinctive in that the gas (mainly C02 with some hydrogen sulfide) blows the package but not the cheese. The defect occurs at 6 - 9 months in Cheddar but a similar defect is sometimes observed earlier in American Mozzarella and Colby. The causative anaerobic organism is not fully identified, however, experiments have demonstrated that the defect does not occur in cheese aged at < 10C.
o Yeast slits due to yeast growth.

Flavour. Most grading systems assign the greatest weight to flavour defects. A few common descriptors are:
o Acid flavour is often associated with acid body defects noted above. The common causes all relate to process control:
+ Too much moisture (i.e., too much lactose).
+ Too much starter (i.e., too much acid development before dipping).
+ Salting too late or too little.
+ Too warm during or immediately after pressing.
o Bitter flavours are common defects in American but also other cheese, including fresh cheese. Some causes include:
# High moisture
# Excess rennet
# Bitter cultures
# High ripening temperatures
+ Fruity/Yeasty flavours are usually associated with high pH and bitterness, and sometimes with yeast slits.
+ Unclean flavours are reminiscent of the barn yard, and may be associated with coliforms.
+ Whey taint is due to high moisture and is usually associated with acid defects including bitterness.

Starter is not used.

About one kilogram of cheese will be obtained from nine liters of milk (cow)
About one kilogram of cheese will be obtained from four liters of milk (sheep)

Method:

1. If necessary pasteurise the milk by heating to 72°C and cooling immediately to 32°C.
2. Add rennet extract to firm curd in 40–45 minutes.
3. Cut the curd into inch cubes.
4. Stir the curds and whey mixture gently and heat to 38–42°C. Stir for 30 minutes after this temperature
is reached.
5. Allow the curd to settle.
6. Ladle the whey off the curd and scoop the curd into a mould lined with cheese cloth. Press lightly for about
one hour.
7. Heat the collected whey to 80–90°C.
8. Remove the cheese from the press and cut it into 10 cm x 10 cm x 2 cm pieces.
9. Place the curd pieces in the hot whey. At first the curd pieces sink but when properly textured they rise
to the surface (not less than 20 mins). Transfer the pieces to a draining table.
10. After about 20 minutes the curd pieces are cool. Sprinkle the curd with 3–5% salt and fold
each piece over.

And enjoy a wonderful nice cheese

For more information please drop by on some homemade cheese recipes:

1. Homemade Farmers Cheese
2. Fankhauser’s Cheese Page
3. Homemade Mozarella Cheese Term Paper

These websites offer recipes, equipment, ingredients, inspiration, advice and other useful resources for home cheesemakers.

New England Cheesemaking Company

Dairy Connection

Glendarry Cheesemaking & Dairy Supply

Fias Co Farm

Cheesemaking Made Easy

The Cheese Supply

Recipes from the Gourmetsleuth.com

Frankhauser’s Cheese Site (lot of recipes and other good info)

SmallDairy.com

The Cheese Maker (thecheesemaker.com)

Guidelines & Tutorials

Here is a link to a video tutorial where Rick shows each step in making a Manchego cheese. This might be helpful to new cheese makers just to see how the process works.

Acid is produced when bacteria turn the lactose sugars in milk into lactic acid. Acid production is essential for milk coagulation and curds formation.

Rennet is produced in stomachs of young mammals in order to help digest milk. One of the steps in digestion is to coagulate the milk, causing milk solids (curds) and liquid (whey) to separate. So, it is also used for that purpose in cheese making.

While there are many enzymes in rennet, the key one is chymosin, also called rennin. But, there are additional enzymes that influence cheese such as lipase.

Rennet is most often produced by extracting it from the fourth stomach of a young calf, and is a by-product of veal production.

Many plants also have coagulating ingredients and these plants are used to produce vegetarian rennet. Nettles and thistles are popular plant-based rennets and are often found in artisan cheeses produced for vegetarians or kosher diets. However, vegetable rennet is not produced on a large scale and some non-meat-byproduct rennets are derived from molds or are genetically engineered.

Curds are milk solids obtained by coagulating milk with either rennet or acid, such as lemon juice or vinegar. Coagulation occurs when acidity causes milk proteins (casein) to bunch into solid masses releasing liquid (whey).

Whey is a protein rich liquid that remains after milk has coagulated producing curds, an important step in cheese production. Whey is often discarded, but can be used to make ricotta, brown cheeses, or used to make bread. It is often used as animal feed in commercial cheese production.

A clean break is achieved when the milk has coagulated enough that when you insert your (clean) finger or a knife into the firm curds at an angle and pull gently straight up, the curd separates/breaks cleanly along a straight line.

Calcium Chloride (CaCl), available in liquid form from cheese making suppliers adds some “salts” to store-bought milk that aids in coagulation. I usually add a small amount to store-bought milks before adding rennet.

CaCl restores balance to milk that has been pasteurized, where the the natural amount of calcium is compromised. It can also help with coagulation when using non-animal-based rennet.

To add to a recipe, dissolve a few drops of CaCl in a 1/4-cup of cool distilled water and stir that into the ripened milk just prior to adding rennet.