Manchego - Yummmm

[deejaydebi]

Well I increased my cheese vat to an 8" deep chaffing dish pan which has a 7 gallon capcity and made my biggest cheese yet - a 7 pound Manchego!

Very exciting for me but oddly after looking at it - it was still just one cheese.



It's actually sitting near a #10 (6.5 pound) can of tomatoes for size comaparison. This is also one of my favorite pressing weights.

Any way here is the recipe I adapted from the book '200 Easy Homemade Cheeses' by Debbie Amrein-Boyes. Nice book!

Manchego - adapted from cheese description

Ingredients:
1 gallon whole Milk.
1/4 teaspoon Mesophilic Type B Culture (CHOOZIT™ Mesophilic Aromatic Type B)
1/4 teaspoon Thermophilic Type B Culture (CHOOZIT™ TM 81)
1/4 teaspoon Lipase Powder
Rennet per manufacturers instructions
1/2 teaspoon Calcium Chloride (if using pasturized milk)
Salt for brine
Olive Oil

Procedure:
Heat milk to 86°F.
Add calcium chloride if needed and sir well.
Add Mesophilic and Thermophilic culture and mix well and leave for 45 minutes.
Mix the lipase powder in 1/4 cup water and let stand for 20 minutes.
Add lipase mixture to the milk and stir gently for 1 minute.
Mix Rennet per manufactures instruction in 1/4 cup of pure water and add to the milk and mix completely.
Once a clean break is achieved cut curds to about 1/2 inch cubes and rest for 5 minutes.
Whisk the curds into rice-size pieces.
Heat the curds to 104°F at a rate of 2°F every five minutes. This will take about 45 minutes. Stir occasionaly to keep curds from matting together.
Rest curds for 5 minutes.
Pour off excess whey.
Drain curds in cheese cloth line collander.
Place curds into a mold, and press with 15 pounds pressure for 15 minutes.
Flip the cheese and press again with 15 pounds pressure for 15 minutes
Flip the cheese and press again with 15 pounds pressure for 15 minutes
Flip the cheese and press again with 30 pounds pressure for 6 hours.
Unwrap cheese and soak medium brine for 6 hours at 50-55°F turning every hour.
Remove cheese from mold and air dry at 50-55° F with a relative humidity of 80-85%.
Turn cheese every day for about a week.
19. Cheese should age for 1 month or longer.

[Tim in NY]

Where do you get the Choosit cultures? What is the purpose of the lipase powder?

[deejaydebi]

Hello Tim

There are many places to get cultures. I believe I got these from one of these three places:

www.dairyconnection.com/

glengarrycheesemaking.on.ca/index.htm

www.danlac.com/

Lipase is the stuff that gives cheese that little bite - picante is the offical word they use I think. It;s mostly used in Italian cheeses but also feta, and blues.

[hazelsmilker]

Impressive cheese!

What kind of cheese cloth do you use? Cotton, or the synthetic? Adding lipase seemed to make my cheeses 'stick' to the cotton cheese cloth something fierce. Kind of ruined the smooth rind and made it hard for the cheese to age gracefully.

[deejaydebi]

I use natural cotton cheese cloth when I use it. I have been pressing in kadova molds and they have a nylon netting built in that work great!

Make sure when you used cheese cloth you sterilize it then before putting your curds in soak it in whey. Dry cheese cloth will always stick! Lipsae is really important for the Italian cheeses. Give it that great sticky cheese smell and the wondeful bite!

Try packing your molds in the whey if posible. You will also find less weight for longer periods works better than heavy wieght for shorter periods. That can of tomatos in the picture is about 6 pounds and my normal pressing weight even for cheddar. These are 3 KG molds too!