In which I learn to make cheese

First of all, what am I doing blogging on the 4th of July? Well, I've already read the Declaration of Independence (and got teary eyed). But it's raining. Nought to do outside when it's raining. My wife is working days today and the kids are playing. What else is there to do but blog?

So, a couple of days ago, I went to my friend Alan's farm to chat with him for awhile and watch as he and his helper made Jack Cheese. It was a pretty cool process. They also made some Garlic and Herb Jack by adding the spices to the curds before pressing.

Here's a picture of the cheese tank. The whole milk is poured in here and the bacteria culture is added. The pole you see going down into the milk is an agitator that spins the milk. The 'smooshy' looking stuff around it is a bit of whipped butter. The little white globs are cheese curds. The milk is stirred and warmed to between 90 and 100 degrees (yes, this is raw-milk cheese). After awhile, the bacteria that has been added begins to grow and form the curds. It takes awhile to reach the right consistency. When the curds are just about right (a point it takes some time to learn) then Alan drains off about 1/3 of the whey and adds that much water back into the tank. The water helps to slow down the bacteria growth so they don't overshoot the 'right' moment for cheese making.

When the curd is 'finished', that is, it sticks a little, but will still fall apart from each other, all the whey is drained off. See the tool at the top of the picture? It's a pitchfork made of stainless steel, with tips that are bent into small loops. Alan says it was an expensive tool. It's used to keep the curds from forming a big sticky mass, as it's passed through them while the whey drains.

After that, some of the curds were moved to a stainless steel sink where spices were added. But eventually, all of the curds were packed into large plastic hoops, lined with cheesecloth. Tops are then put on and a weight is applied to the hoops. This presses all the curds together and makes a nice wheel of cheese. Because it is raw-milk cheese, it will age on a shelf for a minimum of two months.

Alan makes a variety of cheeses. He showed me three large wheels of Parmesan that were soaking in a brine bath (which gives the cheese a rind). He makes jack, cheddar, Swiss, feta, parm, and a variety of other 'farmstead' cheeses (like Hoosier Jalapeno, or Flora and Fauna). Listen, if you've never had real farmstead cheese, you don't know what you're missing. It's absolutely amazing! Here's a link to Alan's farm: The Swiss Connection

This whole process was started about 9:30 or so that morning. I left the farm around 4:00 in the afternoon and the wheels had just had weight applied to press them. Alan said he'd probably turn the wheels over once that evening, again the next morning, and perhaps one more time that afternoon. They would then go on the shelf for aging.

And what does he do with all the whey? Surely you don't imagine he'd throw it down the drain? No way! He has nine pigs that he's raising to butcher. He sells them as 'whey-fed pork'. Yep, they get all the whey they want twice a day. Oh, there are weeds in the lot with them, but they do quite well on whey.

Milk and other thoughts

Well, it's raining like crazy here today, and, as usual, our yard is turning into a lake. Usually once a year in the late winter, we'll get a heafty few days of rain and our yard will fill with water. Fortunately we have good drainage and it's gone the next day. But it's gloomy in the meantime.

I was chatting with a new friend the other day, a man from my church that I just recently discovered owns a grass-fed dairy operation. They live about 40 minutes from here, but they sell homemade cheeses, grass-fed meat and pork... But in Indiana, it's illegal to sell 'raw' milk(also called 'real' depending on who you are and what side of the debate you take).

What is real milk? Not that white water they sell at the store, that's for sure. Real milk is milk that comes from the cow, is filtered for cleanliness, then cooled and sold as is, without being pasteurized. The FDA says it's not healthy to drink this kind of milk and Indiana has made it illegal to sell milk or mild products that are unpasteurized, except for cheese. Now, there are ways to get around this and still be legal. For instance, my friend has a pet food label/line. Basically, he takes the milk or butter he makes and puts the pet food label on it. The label clearly reads "NOT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION". But what you do with it when you get it home is up to you. The other way around it is to buy a share of a cow. You and several other folks go together to pay a farmer for the 'room and board' of a cow and you get some of the return from the cow. The legality is that you aren't buying the milk and butter, but the cow. THIS is legal in Indiana, but the outright sale of it isn't. Man, I can't stand this. Our government is deffinitely too big for its britches.

If you're reading this and wondering why anyone would drink unpasteurized milk in the first place, consider this.... When Louie Pasteur first developed the process of pasteruization (originally used for wine making), refrigeration was not a common practice in homes around the world. Food would spoil but people would go ahead and use it... they'd get sick. But most of the bacteria found in milk only becomes a problem in warm temperatures. Most everyone has a refrigerator today. So the milk is kept cool and the bacteria don't become problematic. Wellllllll.... ok, let me make a clarification. I'll say, milk from a grass-fed cow won't likely become problematic. Feed lot cows? Oh deffinitely, please, pasteurize that stuff... twice if you have to. You see, when a cow is able to feed on pasture and get most of her nutrition from her forage, she's able to ingest bacterium that help her in digestion of her food, in keeping her healthy, and producing safe milk. Her own immunity to disease is stronger, her health is better, and therefore, her milk is safer. They're given medications only when they truly are sick... which isn't often.

Then there are the factory cows. I call any animal (be it chicken, cow, pig... or whatever) raised in close confinement and fed grains and silage (or heaven knows what else in the case of some animals) factory animals. These cows do nothing but stand around on a concrete pad all day, waiting for the next delivery of grain or silage to be dumped in the trough. She eats, then moves into the milk parlor to be milked. Stringent records are kept about her productivity and if she doesn't produce more than, say, 30 pounds or more milk per day, she's outa there. She and her sisters get very little exercise, and probably the only grass they've ever seen is on the other side of the feed lot fence, growing in a narrow strip next to the farm office. These animals are cramped together, staning in their urine and feces all day, being given daily doses of antibiotics in their feed, as well as hormones to promote milk production. You better believe some of those antibiotics and hormones are passed on to you in the milk you drink. Yeah, if I have to drink that stuff, I want it pasteurized.

You see, real milk really is good for you. When milk is pasteurized, some of the natural enzymes are distroyed that help transfer calcium, and vitimins A and D. It's a whole food, not processed. One more thing. If drinking unpasteurized milk was so bad for you, why didn't pioneers and folk who had family cows in years gone by complain of sickness more often than is recorded? Sure a few must have gotten sick... but by and large, people were healthier then than we are now.

Check out www.westonaprice.org for more information on eating more whole foods and real milk.