Hi Folks,

I’m looking to make my first farmhouse cheddar soon.

I’m in Rochester, NY, where the days have been averaging around 80 degrees F. My basement gets down to maybe 72 this time of year. I don’t have air conditioning. Is this to warm to age cheddar? I’m thinking I need to wait until the fall. Unless I can put it in the small dorm fridge I have. But maybe that will be too cool.

Thank you for your advice.

Slim

U dont have a fridge to age it in, the bottom ?

Given the temps you have to work with you’re going to have to do something different.  You will likely have sour cheese if you age it in such warm temps.  The optimum temp for Farmhouse Cheddar is 55 deg.  This allows the desirable bacteria to flourish while retarding the growth of undesirable ones.  If you’re getting into regular cheese making, you will want to work toward an aging refrigerator/freezer.  Utilizing a thermostat, you can regulate your temp pretty closely.  You’ll want to watch the humidity also - it should be up around 85%.  Until you get set up, you can do a fair job with an ice chest.  Set your aging wheel on something in the cooler so its off the bottom, and add enough ice to get the temp down where you want it.  You will have to check it frequently to keep the temp down.  Its not ideal, but it works pretty well.  Good luck and welcome to the Wonderful World of Cheese Making.  Let us know how it works for you.

Yes - what Green Cheese said.

Go for it! I have an aging fridge, BUT…

Get a cooler and put the cheese up on something so it is hovering over the bottom. Throw a couple frozen water bottles in there.
Should get humid from condensation too.

I am doing this right now for beer I am fermenting by the way…it is 55 degrees and 85% humidity in there! Who could ask for more in cheesemaking?

You can pick up a small dorm fridge fairly inexpensively as well.  They work great, but you are limited on how many cheeses you can have in them at any given time.

Welcome to the cheese making craft.

While I do have air conditioning, I don’t have a cheese fridge. I’ve been limited to what cheeses I can make because of it, but I’ve turned out some great cheeses regardless. I’ve aged all of my cheese in the bottom drawer of my fridge and have had fantastic results making cheddar, gouda, feta, and jalapeno cheddar. I’d say as long as it’s not 100 degrees in your house, you should be able to turn out some good cheese….

It’s been close to 90 around here lately, but I think that I will break down and make the caerphilly that I have been planning on making for a couple of months.  I’ve been on a pretty stringent diet, dropped 20 lbs, so haven’t been wanting to be around cheese too much.  But, I am getting the itch again.  Have a good weekend everyone.

Yeah, that no cheese thing sounds really rough.  I understand they have instituted that at Guantanamo.

LOL, I get the same thing. its been 31c here.

Thanks everyone.

I totally understand the ice chest technique.

I do have a dorm fridge already, but it’s too cool. This thermostate thing that was mentioned, I’m looking at $50-$75 for one of those, right?

Finally, of course, I have a regular fridge, with drawers/crispers. Those are going to be too coll, too, right? And if I use a thermostat controller, I don’t imagine there is a way to adjust the temp just in the drawer.

I think I’m good to try the ice chest suggestion, but if anyone can share further details about the other two methods, maybe I’ll understand better and migt try one of those.

Thanks again.

Slim

The thermostat has a probe on a wire you can place anywhere in the fridge or freezer you want. And yes - 50 to 75 bucks US.
The crisper in your fridge without a thermostat control is probably too cold.

Yeah, like T.S. said.  The fridge or freezer is plugged into the thermostat and the thermostat is plugged into the electric outlet.  The function of the thermostat is to override the freezer’s internal thermostat so that the temp remains where you set it; and you can set it in actual degrees.  It will probably fluctuate a few degrees plus or minus, but within acceptable tolerances.

I did a little experiment and I can easily maint tai a temp around 55 in my cooler with frozen half-gallon milk jugs filled with water. The resultant condensation creates some humidity. Is it the recommended 85%, I have no idea, but I think it’s close enough.

I picked up my fresh whole milk from a local dairy and I’m ready to go tomorrow for my first cheddar.

One last question, though, is in regards to the temp requirements for the 12 hours of pressing before the cooler stage. It’s not supposed to be so hot around here the next couple days. Do I need to make any special arrangements for this stage of the process?

Thanks.

Shouldn’t be any problem with the pressing, or even the drying in warm temps.  If you want to monitor the humidity a bit closer they sell a digital thermometer/humidity gauge at Wal Mart for about $6.  Keep notes during the process and write down everything you do and what the conditions are.  Then, several weeks/months from now, you can use them as a reference to spitball improvements or to recreate a really good cheese.