Much has changed in the life of our little cheese in the last 24 hours. Through the science of cheesemaking, which I won't go into now, we have managed to extract and form a gorgeous pale white curd from the milk to create our 200 gm cheese. It really is totally amazing. Within this little round form, are millions of tiny bacteria that have begun their own journey. These tiny beasts have fermented the lactose (sugars) in the milk and converted it to lactic acid. It is these living creatures that will determine the texture and flavour of our cheese over time. Keep them happy and they will do their job perfectly, but beware, if they don't get what they want, they become evil!
In our picture today, the cheese is floating in the brine (saturated salt water bath). The alternative would be to dry salt them, which means essentially dusting all surfaces of the cheese evenly. Salting is another preserving step in the cheesemaking process and also helps flavour development.
Amazing, your not wrong. What a difference in one day. This image reminds me of feta, though I suppose all of your cheeses begin in a identical manner. I've never made cheese before, if you don't mind could you educate me? How does a solid mass of 200g float when a small coin would sink? Are there air bubbles in the cheese at this point in time to assist it to float?
ReplyDeleteGeorge, team Sydney.
Thanks Team Sydney, good question. The answer is that the brine solution is saturated with salt (26%)meaning that it is more dense than the cheese and therefore the cheese floats.
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