Post by Lannie on Sept 28, 2018 8:33:41 GMT -5
Karen, I'm completely baffled. It's got to be the milk, but I can't taste thing one wrong with it. There are no specks at all, even tiny ones, on the filter, there's no lumps or hardness in any of her quarters, the milk from all four tastes like it has honey in it... etc., etc. Typical Cricket-milk.
I started two more batches yesterday afternoon with storebought buttermilk, although that stuff has really changed. It's very thin, barely thicker than regular milk, but it TASTED right, so I used it. I made one quart jar for future starter, and my two-quart batter bowl for the cats. I always cover them with a single thickness of paper towel rubber banded on, just as I've always done. Nothing has changed. This morning, I have milk. They sat in the oven all afternoon and night with the light on, and I just took their temperature and it's 80 degrees. PERFECT. But milk. It tastes like it should, none of that icky sour/bitter flavor, but it didn't "clab." It's not even as thick as the buttermilk I started it with. At least not yet. So I just took the drinking milk pitcher out and filled the cats' bowls with that, and I'm leaving yesterday's batches in the oven for a while longer to see what happens. I stirred the quart, because sometimes stirring it partway through will hasten the setting up.
Maybe it's taking longer because the store buttermilk was insufficient. I checked the label to make sure it says "cultured" and not "flavored" (nothing would surprise me these days), and it does say "cultured low fat milk" on the label. So it should work. I've done buttermilk started clabbers before and they ALWAYS set up overnight. The first few batches are just more buttermilk, but THICK buttermilk, and eventually it turns to actual clabber. So I wait.
I started two more batches yesterday afternoon with storebought buttermilk, although that stuff has really changed. It's very thin, barely thicker than regular milk, but it TASTED right, so I used it. I made one quart jar for future starter, and my two-quart batter bowl for the cats. I always cover them with a single thickness of paper towel rubber banded on, just as I've always done. Nothing has changed. This morning, I have milk. They sat in the oven all afternoon and night with the light on, and I just took their temperature and it's 80 degrees. PERFECT. But milk. It tastes like it should, none of that icky sour/bitter flavor, but it didn't "clab." It's not even as thick as the buttermilk I started it with. At least not yet. So I just took the drinking milk pitcher out and filled the cats' bowls with that, and I'm leaving yesterday's batches in the oven for a while longer to see what happens. I stirred the quart, because sometimes stirring it partway through will hasten the setting up.
Maybe it's taking longer because the store buttermilk was insufficient. I checked the label to make sure it says "cultured" and not "flavored" (nothing would surprise me these days), and it does say "cultured low fat milk" on the label. So it should work. I've done buttermilk started clabbers before and they ALWAYS set up overnight. The first few batches are just more buttermilk, but THICK buttermilk, and eventually it turns to actual clabber. So I wait.
Meanwhile, I'm making cheddar with yogurt as starter, since I have no clabber. I think I actually like it better that way, though, it gives it just a bit more of a tangy sharpness after it's done. But still, I WANT MY CLABBER BACK! (Pitches fit and throws temper tantrum that would rival any naughty 5-year-old child...)
Oh, I meant to say, back right after Cricket calved, she had those tough teat plugs in her two left quarters and because I couldn't milk her the first 36 to 48 hours (I forget now), she got congestion mastitis in them. The left rear was the worst. But I worked those over very well, and got them clear and flowing so Evelyn could nurse easily from them, and they've both been cleared up for about a week now. I taste each quarter before I milk, and I haven't noticed even the slightest off taste. It's possible that there are still some somatic cells roaming around in there, but I also usually give Evelyn that side to nurse, and I bring in the milk from the right side. However (there's that word again!), the last couple days when Evelyn was feeling punky, she didn't nurse very vigorously, so I took the milk from the left rear AND the right quarters, leaving Evelyn just the left front, and even though the milk tastes good from that previously bad quarter, maybe that had an effect. But that was only two days' worth of milk, so that doesn't explain all the other milk that wouldn't clabber. I've tried using cold milk from a couple days ago, and fresh milk right out of the udder, and the result has been the same, either way.
Well, I'll leave the buttermilk-started stuff a few hours longer and see what happens with it. Maybe I'm just being too impatient. That wouldn't surprise anyone, would it? 
