In making _good_ cheese, skim milk is never used. The milk should
either be warm from the cow or heated to that temperature over the
fire. When the rennet is put in, the heat of the milk should be from
90° to 96°. Three quarts of milk will yield, on an average, about a
pound of cheese. In infusing the rennet, allow a quart of lukewarm
water, and a table-spoonful of salt to a piece about half the size
of your hand. The rennet must soak all night in the water before it
can be fit for use. In the morning (after taking as much of it as you
want) put the rennet water into a bottle and cork it tightly. It will
keep the better for adding to it a wine glass of brandy If too large a
proportion of rennet is mixed with the milk, the cheese will be tough
and leathery.
To make a very good cheese, take three buckets of milk warm from the
cow, and strain it immediately into a large tub or kettle. Stir into
it half a tea-cupful of infusion of rennet or rennet-water; and having
covered it, set it in a warm place for about half an hour, or till it
becomes a firm curd. Cut the curd into squares with a large knife, or
rather with a wooden slitting-dish, and let it stand about fifteen
minutes. Then break it up fine with your hands, and let it stand a
quarter of an hour longer. Then pour off from the top as much of the
whey as you can; tie up the curd in a linen cloth or bag, and hang it
up to drain out the remainder of the whey; setting a pan under it to
catch the droppings. After all the whey is drained out, put the curd
into the cheese-tray, and cut it again into slices; chop it coarse;
put a cloth about it; place it in the cheese-hoop or mould, and set it
in the screw press for half an hour, pressing it hard.[M] Then take
it out; chop the curd very fine; add salt to your taste; and put it
again into the cheese-hoop with a cloth about it, and press it again.
You must always wet the cloth all over to prevent its sticking to the
cheese, and tearing the surface. Let it remain in the press till next
morning, when you must take it out and turn it; then wrap it in a clean
wet cloth, and replace it in the press, where it must remain all day.
On the following morning again take out the cheese; turn it, renew the
cloth, and put it again into the press. Three days pressing will be
sufficient.
When you finally take it out of the press, grease the cheese all over
with lard, and put it on a clean shelf in a dry dark room, or in a wire
safe. Wipe, grease, and turn it carefully every day. If you omit this a
single day the cheese will spoil. Keep the shelf perfectly clean, and
see that the cheese does not stick to it. When the cheese becomes firm,
you may omit the greasing; but continue to rub it all over every day
with a clean dry cloth. Continue this for five or six weeks; the cheese
will then be fit to eat.
The best time for making cheese is when the pasture is in perfection.
You may enrich the colour of the cheese by a little anatto or arnotta;
of which procure a small quantity from the druggist, powder it, tie it
in a muslin rag, and hold it in the warm milk, (after it is strained,)
pressing out the colouring matter with your fingers, as laundresses
press their indigo or blue rag in the tub of water. Anatto is perfectly
harmless.
After they begin to dry, (or ripen, as it is called,) it is the custom
in some dairy-farms, to place the cheeses in the haystack, and keep
them there among the hay for five or six weeks. This is said greatly to
improve their consistence and flavour. Cheeses are sometimes ripened by
putting them every day in fresh grass.