Artisan food is unique; it's defined by the fact that nothing else on earth exists that is exactly the same. Artisan food is created with love, with attention to detail, not mass produced on factory lines with only quantity in mind rather than quality
 |
| Traditional Spanish method of molding goats cheese |
 |
| Mature goat cheese, |
 |
| At a cheese workshop showing the clear cut |
 |
| curds |
 |
| cheese made using thistle rennet |
 |
| Natural outer covering, olive oil and paprika |
 |
| mature 45 days with a light wax covering. |
 |
| fresh goat cheese |
The harder’s part of making cheese its maturing it successfully.
ReplyDeleteYou have warmed the milk, got a clean break, separated the curds from they whey and pressed the cheese, now you think the rest its easy? Not so. It like a having a baby you have gone though the pregnancy and had the labour and now you are presented with a beautiful baby, work finished? Harder’s part gone? No. know the real work begins, unlike a bay the cheese will not give you sleepless nights I hope not! I know it’s a strange comparison, but there.
You can not leaves this precious cheese to fend for themselves, and expect a good result, they need nurturing and looking after, no good making it and then leaving for a week holiday and hoping they will be Ok when you return! Believe me they wont, not if they are young and tender, you have to keep an eye on them. In the ideal world we could all have a maturing cave that fill the requirements, but modern times and lack of space in our modern way of living prevents us from doing so.
So how do we achieve this? First of all we need a clean fridge, that hopefully has a ventilator / fan and we can set the temperature a 10c ideal for maturing cheeses.
I place my cheese on a straw mat, and I turn them every day same times twice a day so they have a chance to dry out all over, very important when it comes to preventing unwanted mold formation. If any of my cheese develop any unwanted molds, I rub the effected area with salt, not salmuera or brine as I do not want them to be whet.