Product Message
Hard Cheese Making Kit - Make up to 20kgs of cheese
Make Farmhouse Cheddar, Gouda, Monterey Jack, Feta, Cottage Cheese, Colby, cotswold, Leicester or Ricotta with this easy to use kit.
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| Retail Price: | $85.00 |
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Product Information
The Hard Cheese Kit: This is a sort of beginner Cheese Kit, ideal for those with no cheese making experience however, it is strongly recommended that you follow the instruction book which states that 2 batches of feta be attempted first, then a cheddar before leading up to any of the long term cheeses.
The Basic Hard Cheese Kit makes eight delicious homemade cheeses: Farmhouse Cheddar, Gouda, Monterey Jack, Feta, Cottage Cheese, Colby, and Ricotta.
For the hard cheese like gouda, cheddar or colby, the cheeses need to be stored for a period so they mature. The recommended conditions are 10 degrees and 85% humidity so a cooling storage system is required.
If you are serious about hard cheese making, then you will need to store the cheese once made in a 2nd hand bar fridge or wine fridge. The bar fridge can have the thermostat changed at the appliance centre to maintain the 10 degrees for the period needed. Wine fridges can be bought for around $150 from places like Aldi.
To keep the humidity up, a bowl of water is recommended at the bottom of the fridge. For even more humidity, a storage box like the 10L red ones seen at Coles at perfect and is approx $10.
Why pay gourmet prices when you can learn to make your very own "additive and preservative-free" cheeses? All your family will join you in the fun of this tradition.
The kit comes with a detailed easy to follow directions demystifying all the steps in the cheesemaking process and uses the time saving, convenient and simple to use direct inoculation method. What we love about this is that it can be used with regular full cream milk straight from the supermarket in easy to handle 4 and 8 litre quantities, depending on which cheese you choose to make.
Your kit contains:
- 20 page Recipe / Instruction Booklet
- 1 x 165mm Cheese Mold or Basket
- 1 "Follower"
- 2 x reusable 'loose weave' cheese cloths
- 2 x sterile jars
- 250 gm. Cheese Salt
- Block of natural Cheese Wax
- 1 Natural Bristle Wax Brush
- 50 ml. Calcium Chloride
- 10 gm. Lipase Powder
- 10 Vegetable Rennet Dairy Coagulant Tablets
- 2 x sachets of Direct Inoculation MO 030 Mesophilic Starter Culture
There is enough culture in this kit to make 24 batches of cheese making up to 20kgs of cheese.
Follow the directions with this kit to make 24 cheeses, giving you up to 20 kilograms of eight different types of cheeses. Our suppliers achieve excellent results using pasteurised and homogenised milk organic and non-organic.
The kit has everything you need to make cheese, except for some common kitchen equipment & the milk. Extra equipment you will need will include
- a stainless steel pot large enough to hold 4L of milk
- a stainless steel slotted spoon
- a stainlesss teel ladle
- a stainless stell knife large enough to reach the bottom of the pot
- a large stainless steel corander
- measuring cups
- measuring spoons
- mini measuring spoons - order from us in our 'cheese making tools' category.
Our suppliers are local business owners truly passionate about making their own food. They wish to share their successes with you which is how these unique home cheese making kits have evolved.
A full help and support line is available by request to assist you beyond your instruction booklet.
Please note: your kit and/or equipment will be dispatched directly from our cheese makers to ensure it arrives safely and quickly by express post or as fast as we can get it to you. We do not keep kits onsite at this stage due to the freezer and refridgeration conditions needed for some of the kit items.
Common Questions
Question: My cultures have arrived, but the cooler blocks have melted, and everything feels warm, is this OK ?
Yes !! Just store the items "as advised" as soon as possible.
To be honest, most cheese making ingredients and yoghurt cultures are shipped to us from overseas, without any cooling, and we just store the items correctly, once they get to us.
What we wish to avoid is anyone getting their yoghurt or cheese cultures, and storing them in the pantry for many months, without even knowing that they needed to be put in the fridge or freezer.
Perhaps we are "overcompensating" with cooler blocks, and labels all over the place, but we do know someone who kept an unopened cheese kit in a hot pantry for two years.
Question: How do I store the culture, and other cheese making ingredients ?
The dry items like cultures and rennet tablets should be stored in a freezer, and liquid items like liquid rennet should be stored in a refrigerator.
We supply sterile jars free with the culture sachets, and these are for the storage of the cultures once the sachets are opened. We recommend not to open the sachet until you are about to make your first cheese.
When opening the sachet of culture we recommend bringing it to room temperature first. This will reduce the effect of the condensation causing some of the culture being stuck to the inside of the sachet. Cut all the way across the top of the sachet, then concertina it, and pour the culture into the sterile jar supplied.
Please be carefull to close your jar properly, to keep the moisture out while it is in the freezer.
Question: How do I test my rennet ?
Heat one cup of milk to 32C, and if using homogenised milk, add 2 drops of Calcium Chloride. (Do not add citric acid.)
Dissolve 1/4 rennet tablet (or 1/4 tsp. liquid rennet) in 225ml of cool water and stir well. From this diluted rennet take 2 tablespoons and add it to the milk at 32C. Stir gently from the bottom to the top for 30 seconds.
If the rennet is working, the milk surface will begin to firm or form a slight film after two minutes. After six minutes, it will have formed a curd that will hold a knife cut.
Question: How much culture do I use ?
Our Mini Measuring Spoons give a pretty accurate dose measurement.
With our MOT 092 Thermophilic and MO 030 Mesophilic cultures the sachet is suitable for 100 litres of milk, and will give twelve standard doses, if following our instructions. A heaped “Smidgen” (1/32nd tspn) will give twelve doses from these sachets.
With our MO 036 Mesophilic culture the sachet is suitable for 1000 litres of milk, and will give over 100 doses, if following our instructions. A heaped "Drop" (1/64th tspn) will give approximately 100 doses from this sachet.
It is a good idea to record how many doses you get from your culture to confirm that you are measuring correctly.
Question: How do I know if my cheese is dry enough to wax ?
Once the cheese has been pressed it is removed form the mould and set out to dry on a wooden cheese board. Drying can take several days, during which time the cheese is turned to ensure even drying. When “dry” the cheese should both appear, and feel dry to the touch.
Question: What do I do about mold on my cheese, while drying?
Because of the high humidity in some parts of Australia, drying can sometimes take more than just a "few days", so there is an increased chance of mould spores in the air landing on your cheese. To remove the mould simply wipe it off with a vinegar moistened cloth.
Question: What do I do about mold on my cheese, under the wax ?
So when removing the wax, you find some mould has grown on your cheese ... just cut it of and enjoy the rest of your cheese adventure.
Question: I have a "Starter Kit", but I want to make more advanced cheeses, where do I get the instructions ?
You can get away with making the more simple cheeses in our starter kit, with the limited instructions supplied ... but our kit is just that, a "starter kit" ... as you move onto more complex cheeses, a much greater depth of knowledge is needed, such as can be found in the Ricki Carroll book, "Home Cheese Making" .....
Question: My cheese has a bitter taste. What could have gone wrong ?
Too much rennet can give the cheese a bitter taste. Reduce the amount of rennet in your next attempt at this cheese.
Contamination due to poor hygiene can cause a bitter taste. This can happen to the best of us so be sure your working environment is clean and that you have sterilized all your utensils. If you are using raw milk, pasteurise it before making your cheese to ensure that there are no unwanted pathogens in your milk.
Your milk became to acidic. This is caused by the milk over ripening once you have added your culture. Over ripening is cased by adding too much culture or leaving it to ripen for too long. Be careful with your measuring of the culture and watch your timing.
Double boilers are expensive, what else can I use?
Large stockpots come from a local hardware store, with the smaller two suitable for smaller milk batches, and these two suitable for up to 10 or even 12 litres.
