Dave:
Hijack away!
Yes, I love the PVC caps! Is it you who suggested that? I made a quick search back to try to find who had given me the idea so I could give proper credit, but was unable to find it in my haste.
I love the idea of the 3” pressure caps. I tried a two-inch to make a log for cracker-size slices, and the cheese cloth and curds were too much for the small diameter. It was not a success, but I didn’t put much effort into it. Anyway, the 3” cap sounds like a great idea. I love the coupling idea for stability. Would never have thought of that myself.
In my two-inch debacle, the pressing was a big part of the problem. I tried pressing two and three and four at a time. The amount of curd has to be exact per each mold, or one or more of them don’t have the proper amount of pressure. If you figure this out, please let me know.
Also the multi-colored waxes are great. I only have red, but plan to get yellow and black also. I keep mine in a crockpot, so I just need to pick up a couple of more cheap crockpots and will be set.
My Christmas gift was a wine fridge. It’s a 72-bottle, I think. It’s narrow and tall. I love it! I have suddenly found myself with three weeks with not much going on at work, so I plan to get to cheesing!
Jeanne,
After speaking with a friend, I did get a really good suggestion on making the baby Gouda wheels, using 3” caps…
He recommended turning one of the caps upside down…placing the coupling or a piece of 2-1/2” PVC pipe on the domed part of the cap and then hot gluing the two together. This would no doubt add extra stability to the mold.
This would serve as the base mold for the following:
He then suggested drilling holes in the SIDE of all of the caps through which the whey can escape.
By using this method his idea is to stack the caps on top of one another and press them in a column, allowing the cheese above to press the cheese below.
Between each cap there would have to be a very short piece of PVC pipe that would cradle the upper cap while pressing on the follower in the lower cap.
By having the holes drilled in the side of the caps the whey can escape without having to drain through the lower curd.
I thought this idea was fantastic in it’s simplicity but then again I’ve really come to respect the ideas this guy comes up with. He’s also the one who came up with the pneumatic cheese press that I posted above as well as many other creations to make is cheese making more productive.
I’m going to try to give this a try within the next couple of weeks and I’ll let you know how it works out. Right now it is only theory but it does seem feasible to me.
Also, I’m really glad you like the 6” thin wall PVC cap as a mold. I stumbled onto this by accident but it is still about my favorite mold.
Just as a suggestion, they also make an 8” thin wall PVC cap with the same flat bottom (in fact in this cap there is no dome whatsoever). I haven’t tried one as yet but it would really make an impressive wheel of cheese since it is also deeper.
If you would like trying a swiss cheese, you can get a three gallon curd into the 6” cap and it makes a wonderful, thick wheel. As for Colby, Cheddar, Jack & Gouda, I’ve never been able to get more than a 2 gallon cheese to fit into the 6” size.
As I said, I’ll be trying the baby Gouda idea in the next couple of weeks and I’ll be sure to let you know how it works.
Have a great weekend.
Dave