So yesterday I decided I needed to make a Monterey Jack.  I really like this cheese, but my past efforts had not been too successful.  The taste was great, but it always turned out too dry and crumbly.  I really don’t think I let it acidify too much, so I was kind of at a loss as to what the problem was.  After doing a bit of research, it seems I may have been using too much by way of ingredients.  It was suggested I use less culture and/or rennet.  I do know that when making adjustments, it’s best to make them one at a time, so you know what difference a specific adjustment makes.  With that in mind, I decided I would reduce the rennet by half.  So instead of using a teaspoon of rennet for my 4 gallon batch, I went with 1/2 tsp.  It was a noticeable difference, as it took a bit longer to reach clean break; but the quality of the curd seemed to be the same once it got there.  It took 45 minutes instead of 30.

Another change is that I used Tammy’s recipe, which calls for a wash, bringing curd temp down to 79 F. prior to salting and packing.  There was too much curd to fit into my 6” mold, so I went with the 8”, adjusting pressing weight accordingly.  I pressed at 25 lbs for 30 min, then 35 lbs for an hour, followed by 35 lbs for 12 hours.  Here’s the finished wheel out of the press:

Looks great !
I heard, (we actualy talked about long ago) that the culture can do that when their is too much, the reaction is faster and can be arunaway train. I would do less culture and keep the rennet to the letter.

Hey! Haven’t been here for awhile. I have made a bunch of pepper jack as a washed curd cheese, and it really does add to the moisture content. I don’t use that Just Jack recipe anymore, but I do believe that the clue is that it is a washed curd cheese. I guess I could post my recipe that I am using now.

Monterey Jack / Pepper Jack
Yield: 2 lbs
2 gallons whole milk
1/4 tsp calcium chloride diluted in ¼ cup cool water (if using pasteurized milk)
1 pkt mesophilic culture or 1/4 tsp MA 011
½  tsp liquid rennet dissolved in ¼ cup cool water or ½ tablet vegetable rennet
1   tbs kosher salt or 2% of curd weight
1 4-1/2” or 2lb cheese mold

For Pepper Jack you will also need

1-1/2 tsp chopped jalopeno
1-1/2 tsp dried red pepper flakes
1 tsp dried jalopeno flakes

• Take the red pepper flakes and jalapeño’s and put them in a pot with ½ cup of water and bring them to a boil. Turn off and set aside to cool.

• Heat milk to 88°.  Note PH level

• Add calcium chloride, if using, and stir

• Add starter.  Let float 1 min, stir 1 min.  Ripen for 40 min. Check PH level and note it. PH level should have dropped .10.

• Dissolve rennet in 1/4 c. cool water, and add to milk. Stir 1 min.  Let set until clean break - about 35 min. If checking by flocculation method, use a multiplier of 3.

• Cut curd in 1/2” chunks, heal 5 minutes.

• Heat curd to 102°F, stirring often to prevent matting.  This should take about 45 minutes.

• Hold curd at 102°F and continue stirring for 45 to 60 minutes. PH level should be 6.3 to 6.2

• Drain whey to 1” above the curd level, add 60° water until the temperature drops to 80 to 86°. Stir for 15 minutes. PH level should be 6.0 to 5.9

• Drain whey down to level of curd, and stir for 10 minutes.

• Drain in colander lined with cheese cloth, and return curd to pot. Stir for 15 minutes. PH level should be 5.7 to 5.8

• Add ½ of the salt, and all of the pepper and water mixture, stir well. Let rest about 5 minutes to absorb the salt and pepper flavors. Then add the rest of the salt and stir again. Wait 5 more minutes.

• Place curd into a 4” mold lined with cheese cloth and press at 20 lb. pressure for 15 min

• Remove from mold, flip over and rewrap.  Press at 30 lb. pressure for 2 hours.

• Remove from mold, flip over and return to press.  Press at 40 lb. for another 10 hours.

• Remove from mold and air dry until rind is uniformly dried. Usually 2 to 5 days. I do this inside of the cave at 50°

• Wax and age for at 3 to 4 months. I average 4 months on this cheese.

Yield: 2 lbs cheese

Thanks for sharing that, Tammy; and it’s good to see you back again.  Hope you’ll make it a habit.

The Just Jack recipe you posted in the recipe section is also a washed curd recipe, although it cools to a lower temp.  That should result in even more moisture.  The pH marks should be helpful, too.

Anyway, I doubt I’ll be able to wait 4 months to dig into this one.  I’m thinking more like 2 months.  I need to see if the texture is right.  If not, I’ll be making more adjustments.

Tammy, I see you got in That looks yummy. I’ll be starting up my cheese making again soon, and that is a recipe I must try.

BTW all, I am retiring from the hectic work world to go live “off the grid” at the cabin in Colorado. There, I hope to get back into making cheese (and many other home-made things). You can follow along at: http://www.rickandlynne.com/otg

Rick

Well, Rick, as one who has retired almost 2 years ago, I can attest to the benefits of not having to deal with the mass of humanity in the work-a-day world.  When people ask me how I like retirement, I tell them, “It’s great!  I do what I want, when I want and blow off the rest.”  You will find, however, that once you start counting the time until retirement, the days tend to go by very, very slowly.

All the best to ya’.

Rich,

You are right. Time is slowing down! But, that is giving us time to get the house ready to sell

Rick

Having your own land is like being King, would be awesome. Ive been retired for 15 years (Disability lol). Not having a room to do what one wants can be disheartening.
Congrats on not being part of the Rat Race

In Gianaclis Caldwell’s book she states that it’s not the exact PH number that matters, its the fact that your ph level drops the same amount in the right amount of time. I put that in another post somewhere so I’m not typing all of that again. But you don’t know what the ph level of everyone’s milk starts at, and PH level and acidity do not go hand in hand. The ph level drops as the acidity rises, but you can’t say that a ph level of 6 has an acidity rating of a specified amount.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but pH and acidity level DO go hand in hand, because pH is a measure of acidity/alkalinity.  So yes, if you have a pH of 6 that IS the specified amount.  Perhaps when we do our recipes we should specify the amount of drop in pH instead of a target pH mark.

I agree with the writing the recipe with the drop in PH idea. I am teaching cheese classes once a month now, so I am keeping records of 6 vats of cheese once a month. As I go through my recipes I am going to enter the ph level as a drop.

What do you do when you are making cheese and ph level goes up? It happens to me every now and again. It happened to two of my students yesterday, and they asked what did I usually do when that happened. I told them I put the ph meter up and continue the recipe as noted. I have no idea what to tell people for that one.

Teaching classes Bea, thats awesome !!
keep those records precise

t beaman - 08 February 2015 04:11 PM

I agree with the writing the recipe with the drop in PH idea. I am teaching cheese classes once a month now, so I am keeping records of 6 vats of cheese once a month. As I go through my recipes I am going to enter the ph level as a drop.

What do you do when you are making cheese and ph level goes up? It happens to me every now and again. It happened to two of my students yesterday, and they asked what did I usually do when that happened. I told them I put the ph meter up and continue the recipe as noted. I have no idea what to tell people for that one.

That happened with the Gouda I made Friday.  When the pH finally reached 6.99 I chalked it up to a malfunctioning meter.  I did what you did.  I put up the meter and went on about my business.  I can’t imagine the cheese actually getting more alkaline.

It is tough to keep precise records in class. You have 5 or 6 people making cheese at the same time. It starts out well, everybody writes on their log that I give them for most of the class. But somewhere towards the end when things start moving faster we all quit writing it down and just do it.

I keep all of the cheeses for aging so I have figured out that when I weigh cheeses out of the press you can look back at the papers and tell why. It’s not wrong, but if someone let their cheese get 2 degrees hotter than someone else’s, their cheese will weigh slightly less. Or if someone cooked theirs 10 minutes longer than they were supposed to it has the same effect.

I type up all of the cheese logs in my computer the next day for comparison.

Some pics from your class would be great.

Green Cheese Maker - 10 February 2015 06:25 PM

Some pics from your class would be great.

Yup !!