If the milk was mature, or too much rennet was incorporated with
perfectly sweet milk, the whey will separate from the solids very
rapidly. In either case it wants an immediate application of heat
after cutting. Curd from fairly good milk, with a proper infusion of
rennet, should stand for a few moments after cutting before heat is
turned on. Never apply heat under any circumstances until the raw
curd has all disappeared beneath the whey’s surface. As soon as the
heat has warmed the bottom of the vat, bare your arms and with the
hands gently lift the new cut mass to the surface. In this lifting
give it a rolling motion, so that the cubes will all fall apart and
exchange positions with one another.
Two dangers now arise and you must be prepared to steer straight
between them. First, as the heat comes surging up from beneath
against the tin bottom of the vat it makes it very hot below and cool
on top. If the raw curd settles but a moment against the hot bottom
it is liable to be blistered and seared over, to the subsequent
detriment of the whole mass. Of course, it needs a slow application
of heat on the start and almost constant agitation, and here comes
danger number two. If you do not stir your curd sufficiently in
heating, the quality of your goods is at stake, and if you do not
stir judiciously, or stir too often and too harshly, your milk ratio
is in jeopardy. By exercising good judgment, care and caution you can
avoid the two extremes and make each danger your willing servant. If
your milk on the start is sweet and pure, allow the heat to go up
slowly until it touches the desired point. If, on the other hand,
it is ripe, old or sour, push the heat with all vigor and scald as
quickly as possible. With milk all right, about three-fourths of
an hour’s time should be consumed in bringing up the heat to the
scalding limit, but if otherwise get it there in fifteen minutes or
half an hour, according to the exigency of the case.
But, to return to the subject of scalding a vat of curd in normal
condition. On the start, using your hands as described, manipulate
it with such care that the tender cubes are not bruised and yet
are kept separate enough so that they will not form into a compact
mass on the warm bottom. All this time the whey is percolating from
the blocks and they are shrinking in size and becoming of tougher
texture. As soon as the curd begins to assume a slightly elastic
consistency begin operations with a rake. If you have an idea that
curd wants to be stirred all of the time through the scalding period,
at once disabuse your mind of it. Such a notion is antediluvian in
its conception and disastrous in its results, but, strange to say,
it is the predominating feature of the know-it-all young maker’s
knowledge. Novices at the business are sure to stir too often and too
violently. This knocks off the yield and also injures the quality of
the cheese. For myself, above all patent devices in the shape of wire
rakes for agitating curd, I prefer a simple wooden hand hay rake. Get
one made of wood throughout and saw off the handle, leaving the stub
about four feet long; this will insure convenient handling. When the
moment arrives in the early cooking departure to use the rake, take
the utensil described and, inserting it teeth up in the whey and curd
midway of the vat at one end, push it gently from you to within two
inches of the farther edge, letting the back of the rake head slide
on the bottom of the vat. Be sure and do not let the teeth and head
of the agitator hit the side of the vat, as curd is pushed before it
which does not want the substance and nutriment crushed out of it
that way. As the rake approaches the side of the vat give it an easy,
undulating, upward swing, ending by a draw of the rake toward you.
This will cause the curd that you have been pushing from you along
the bottom of the vat to boil up with the whey in the wake of the
retreating rake. If the motion has been gone through with easily and
carefully, you will at once see that the curd within the rake’s sweep
has been thoroughly agitated without bruising. After the manoeuvre
described, do not change position but drawing the rake toward you,
with its head scraping the bottom of the vat, produce a gentle
ebullition of curd and whey in the same way as that just manifested.
Step along, repeating the pushing and drawing of the rake until the
farther end of the vat is reached. Then, push the curd with the rake
up on one side and down on the other of the vat, changing ends, as
it were, with the cooking cheese. Once over a vat in this way, if
accomplished properly, thoroughly separates the curd particles and
evens up the heat through the whole mass. Now, let the rake rest
but have the heat go on for a few moments. When the curd begins to
pack slightly (perhaps in five minutes, more or less, according to
the previous maturity of the milk), again stir it up in the manner
described and again let it rest, repeating the periods of agitation
until it is scalded up to the desired temperature. In regard to
the right temperature at which to scald cheese we cannot hope to
give on paper much more than superficial information. Every phase
of cheese making, to be thoroughly understood, requires practical
experience, but hints and pointers on paper are often just what are
needed to help puzzled ones out of awkward dilemmas encountered in
the business. Hence, we shall, in the most clear and logical manner
possible, give the reader our views, derived from experience, on
scalding temperature.