18th & 19th century cheese making

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Robson Valley

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Nov 24, 2014
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McBride, BC
This is worth watching. I started cheese making in 1975.
The enzyme, "rennilase" is in most grocery stores.

The added bacterial culture is essential for ecological reasons.
Same strategy as using a defined yeast for beers and wines.
Nothing has changed over the centuries.

Did a 4-day cheese making workshop. I wanted to learn more of the finishing processes.
We made different cheeses every day.
I wanted to get together with a few people and make serious cheese but for most, it was just entertainment.

If you can find a big supply of cheap milk and if you have a use for the whey you are good to go.
= = = =
Now I understand how early man could domesticate herds of mammals (sheep/goats/cattle).
and preserve the excess milk protein in long term storage.
 
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Janne

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Boil slowly the whey down to a thick paste. You get a Swedish/Norwegian milk product called Mes ost/ Myse ost/ Brun ost
You can add cream and it is loved by children.
And adults.

Norwegian milk product company Tine exports it to North America.
 

Toddy

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Jan 21, 2005
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I like that channel, and yes, the cheesemaking one is worth watching.

You can use up the whey to make Blaand. It's a traditional drink of Northern Europe, from Scotland to Russia (I think they call it yirpa or something like that).
Basically it's fermented whey that's usually as strong as a decent beer, but can turn out to be as strong as wine.
Goat's milk is supposedly the best for it, they say it's sweeter :dunno: I have to admit that even when I could drink milk I was never fond of goat's milk. One of my Mum's cousins bred goats and there was never a shortage of the stuff.

Janne? does the Mes ost taste like the boiled down milk stuff that the Indians make ? a bit like carnation milk ?
 
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Janne

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Toddy,
Simply said - yes.

It varies from light in colour, runny and sweet to dark in colour, solid and sweet. The latter has a slightly caramelized taste too.

Made from cows milk, Sheeps milk, or a mix of those two.

Aquired taste. Son can take one slice of Cows version, wife none, and I love it!

I tried Goats milk once. Brrrrrrrr.....
I am not a milk drinker anyway, but that goaty stuff....
Like both goat and sheep cheese!
 

Keith_Beef

Native
Sep 9, 2003
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Yvelines, north-west of Paris, France.
Janne, brunost must be made from sweet whey, the clear liquid that separates off from making a hard cheese. The whey from soft cheese like cottage cheese is quite acidic.

In Iceland, it is traditionally used in place of vinegar for pickling vegetables. I tried a small glass of it when I was in a restaurant there in March. Quite salty, too; it was a bit like the liquid around Mozzarella when you buy it in a plastic pouch (I drink that, too).
 

Janne

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Yes, the whey you get once rennet separated the curds from it.

If the whey is acidic means they added some kind of acid in the manufacture of the Cottage C.?

I do not know how the Islanders make their cheese, but in normal cheese making the curds are salted after they are drained, so the whey liquid is not salty.
I get an aciduc whey when I make cheese from youghurt or kefir.
The result in kvarg or kvark.
Like a more acidic Cottage Cheese.
I wonder if that is not the way the Islanders do?

They eat a lot of preserved/ acidified milk, Skyr is one of them, so it kind of feels logical.

The sweetness in the ‘concentrated rennet’ comes from lactose.

The original version is something called Messmör ( whey butter) in Sweden, it is a thick, but still runny spread.
The brunost (No) or mes ost (Sw) is a more concentraded, some more caramelised, form.
Commercial Mozzarella is usually stored in brined whey, or cheaper ones, in brine.
If you are lucky to visit an artisanal mozzarella maker, he will store it in pure, cold water. That mozzarella only lasts for a few days though.
 

Janne

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To boil the whey down to the liquidy form is an ancient way to use as much from scant resources as possible.

I recall they found remains in a pot 5000 years old, in Denmark.
 

Keith_Beef

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Sep 9, 2003
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They eat a lot of preserved/ acidified milk, Skyr is one of them, so it kind of feels logical.

Adverts for Skyr are all over the place in Iceland and it's been heavily promoted over here in France, too.

The night before leaving Iceland, I finally made it to a supermarket (Bónus) and managed to get a carton of surmjölk. Delicious stuff, practically identical to the laban that I drink every morning for breakfast.
 
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Janne

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I love preserved milk in all its forms, the older the better. I have tried Skyr here ( US made) and in Norway ( Norwey made) and must say I am not impressed.
Weak flavor, weak acidity.

Full fat Kefir is my favourite.
Full fat Greek second.


Making cheese must be one of the oldest culinary arts, besides beer and wine making.
 

santaman2000

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Adverts for Skyr are all over the place in Iceland and it's been heavily promoted over here in France, too.

The night before leaving Iceland, I finally made it to a supermarket (Bónus) and managed to get a carton of surmjölk. Delicious stuff, practically identical to the laban that I drink every morning for breakfast.
I can’t say I’ve ever seen it, let alone tasted it. How does it compare tp buttermilk?
 

Janne

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Think less acidic less tasteful yoghurt.
The US brand is Siggi’s.

I had a bowl just tonight, had to check if it was as I wrote earlier.
It is.
Son did not like it either.
We watched the movie Siberia with Keanu Reeves.
Movie not good. Lots and lots of faults, crap ending.
 

Keith_Beef

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Sep 9, 2003
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Yvelines, north-west of Paris, France.
I can’t say I’ve ever seen it, let alone tasted it. How does it compare tp buttermilk?

I didn't taste the skyr. The surmjölk is practically the same as the laban I buy under various names and from various makers, but a little bit less acidic and a little bit thicker. Or that might have been because I bought it one night and drank it the next morning, and didn't have a refrigerator to keep it in overnight...

The laban that I get from the corner shop near my home is also marked in Letzeburgesch as "bottermëllech", which is visibly a cognate of "buttermilk".

Buttermilk is a traditional staple of Brittany, and it's often sold in France under the name "lait ribot" with the flag of Brittany (the "gwenn ha du") on the label. The Breton term is "laezh-ribod", meaning "butterchurn-milk"...

This kind of two-way loaning amuses me: in French, it's "lait ribot", where "ribot" is a loan word from Breton, while in Breton it's "laezh-ribod" where "laezh" is a loan word from French,

It's been a long time since I tasted buttermilk in the US, and I don't think I ever tasted it when I was growing up in England. They all vary slightly in acidity and thickness between countries and within countries they vary from one brand to the other very slighlty.
 
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Keith_Beef

Native
Sep 9, 2003
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Yvelines, north-west of Paris, France.
I went to the corner shop yesterday evening for some more laban, and found a carton of "raïb" by Luxlait.
Ra%C3%AFb-SITE.png


I just tried it: it's more like a very wet cottage cheese; there are distinct chunks, but they are very, very soft. It's slightly more acid than the Luxlait laban, and is also 2.5% fat, compared to 1.5% for the laban.

I've been trying to compose the word "raïb" in Arabic, to try to find more information about it, but can't manage to get what I think is the third letter. From right to left, I see "reh", "alef", then something unidentifiable, then "beh".

ETA: I found an article on how to make the stuff at home, and that article uses the word "رايب", so by searching in a Unicode character utility, I found "reh", "alef", "yeh" and "beh"; yeh on its own looks different, "ي" which is why I didn't recognise it.

The article is in French and Arabic; it looks like you need to start with a live yoghurt and some milk, and leave the two together to work overnight.
 
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