I just received my pH meter, and in preparation for getting into the regulated swing of cheese making I’m trying to assemble some markers for various cheeses. I got Dave’s Gouda marks. I was looking at Nabil’s cheddar marks (from Peter Dixon) and I was wondering if these marks were accurate for any cheddar type cheese? And does anyone have pH markers for Monterey Jack?
Rich,
For the Monterey Jack, use the following:
Target at drain: 6.2.
After draining, settle and press lightly under the whey to form an initial mass. After most of the whey has been drained off you’re ready to salt. pH here should be 6.0. Salt, hoop, press, and wait until pH is ~5.5, and you’re done.
This is information that I’ve received from Linuxboy (also a member on this forum), who has an understanding of the science behind cheese making that FAR surpasses my own.
On a side note, I can’t begin to tell you, (Rich), how excited I am that you’ve gotten a Ph meter. I can’t wait to hear how things turn out for you.
The only thing I can caution on Jack making is to really watch the amount of culture you use. This, (at least in my experience) is a difficult cheese to make properly.
Make sure your curd is cooked well before draining, even if you have to increase the heat drastically to slow down acid production.
I’m yet to make a Jack that I’m proud of even though I’ve tried a couple of times since using a meter.
Good luck with whatever you decide to make first, (I recommend my Gouda recipe).
Yes, those cheddar marks are good for any cheddar. Although let me rephrase… you can target slightly different points to achieve a more nuanced profile if you find the marks are off for your milk or culture. For example, cheddar drains range from 6.0 to 6.25. That range can produce VERY different cheddar textures and flavors, but they are used in combination with the different acidification rates of culture. For example, some mesophilics like to be very slow and will drop pH by .5 over 4 hours, then have a sharp drop, whereas others may do that initial .5 over 1 hour, and then taper off, and yet others are more steady.
pH is a wonderful guide to help achieve consistency provided that you change only one thing at a time and keep notes and note failures and keep reproducing results. It’s easier to do in large batches. With a small batch, it’s tough to add a consistent amount of DVI initial starter culture without a gram scale that goes out to .01.
Sailor and I put together a pH table for many cheeses. I’ll ask him if he wants to post it. If not, ask here for a style and I’ll try to help.
Dave, I started reading your post and I thought “huh, those targets are what I’d use”, then realized I wrote them
Nabil, its good to hear your evoice again - its been a while. A further question on this topic: Can the pH mark be altered to affect the sharpness of the cheese, or is that strictly a function of aging time? i.e., If I lower the pH, say at the drain, will it result in a sharper cheese, or just a drier one? I’m guessing a little variance in the pH level will have a very noticable affect. Another thing, when the culture gets to moving, especially at higher temps during cooking, its hard to catch it just right.
I am slowly coming to the opinion that PH matters, so need some help.
Can anyone point me to some page, book, information, where I can read this stuff? I have tried following on this and other sites, but it’s very disjointed and incomplete.
Where does one go to find a ‘collection’ of recipes, rather than the odd one or two, which have PH markers noted? Most of the books I own don’t even mention PH.
Not yet, we’re working through recipes and jotting down our pH notes and then tasting the results. Sailor’s busy with his new office, and so am I. Happy to share notes on a cheese I’ve made before, though. Let me know what style you want to try and copy and I’ll try to help. There are only a dozen or so major variations with regards to pH, the rest are modified variations, or starter culture and temp changes. That produces thousands of different types of cheeses, along with affinage practices.
Newbie, this resource doesn’t exist (yet). It will hopefully by the end of the year. I’m working on updating all the recipes in books and online into authoritative ones with pH markers and more detailed make an affinage notes. Will be released as a wiki or similar open-source project, most likely.
Newbie, this resource doesn’t exist (yet). It will hopefully by the end of the year. I’m working on updating all the recipes in books and online into authoritative ones with pH markers and more detailed make an affinage notes. Will be released as a wiki or similar open-source project, most likely.
Hurrah!...... If you need any help, please don’t hesitate to ask. Can’t wait till you publish.
Seems like we will not be releasing the sheet in its current form, but I am continuing ahead with creating a recipe section as part of my PNW cheese club initiative and site. Recipes will have pH markers. And of course can always answer questions here or on cheeseforum.
It’s a club I’m trying to launch early next month here in the Seattle area for home and artisan cheesemakers. We have a commercial organization/guild for commercial producers in WA, but it’s more about networking and promoting sales and marketing than a place where people can go and hang out, taste cheese, share tips, take classes and seminars, etc. It’ll be sort of like a homebrew club, but for cheeseheads. I’d like to teach classes and help new people start off right making great cheese instead of figuring everything out for themselves and wasting milk. There are 6-8 farms in the area that teach cheesemaking, and some are decent, but not exactly a club where people can talk in person and follow up 3 months later to figure out what went wrong.
