338 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
Written for the American Agriculturist.—Prize Articles. 
The Dairy—VIII. 
cheese making. {Continued from p. 202.) 
The necessary constituents of a first-rate 
cheese are1st. Pure milk, new and rich, 
with all its cream retained. 2nd. Clean, well 
preserved rennet made of the calf’s stomach. 
3d. Clean, and perfectly pure salt. 
Whatever ingredients beyond these are put 
into cheese—whether to give it a flavor aside from 
its natural taste, or to color it, or to hasten its 
maturity—are something foreign to the simple un¬ 
adulterated article of a pure and honest cheese. 
These compounded, and as we hold, artificial 
tastes and qualities in cheese, are not suited to 
the demands of the usual markets to which our 
American cheese is consigned ; the ingredients 
added are besides, exceedingly variant and ca¬ 
pricious in their tastes and qualities. We only 
propose now to treat of the article which may be 
readily produced in all our dairies within the lim¬ 
its elsewhere described as best devoted to that ob¬ 
ject. 
As the making of cheese is a matter of detail 
in its manipulations, the various items may as 
well be arranged in their regular order ; and we 
proceed : 
Let the milk be thoroughly and cleanly drawn 
from the cows into clean, sweet pails, taken into 
the cheese room, and strained into a vat, or into 
a receptacle leading into a vat of sufficient size to 
hold the entire mass—milk, curd, and whey—of 
which the cheese is to be made. This vat should 
have a double bottom and sides—a vat within a 
vat. The bottom of the outer one should be of 
copper or sheet iron, to set over the furnace or 
stove which is to heat it—and if the whole case, 
or ouler boiler or vat, be copper or iron, it will 
be quite as well. The width and depth of the 
space between this outer vat and the inner one 
will depend somewhat on its size, say from 2 to 4 
inches, as it has to hold water or steam sufficient 
to surround and heat the milk and curd contained 
in the inner vat to 100 degrees, or more. This 
inner vat may be made of wood, tin, or copper, 
and circular in shape like a tub, that the curd 
cutter may revolve in it when turned by a crank. 
Of course, as before remarked, this inner tub is to 
be of suitable size, for the entire quantity of 
milk in the fullest season : but as it will work 
half full quite as well, it will equally accommo¬ 
date the lessened quantity of milk in the differ¬ 
ent seasons. 
The above remarks relate to the morning's milk 
when the curd is to be immediately run up. But 
the evening’s milk is to be strained into pans in 
a cool place, as if for butter making, and there 
remain until the next morning. Then the cream, 
what there is of it, is to be carefully skimmed off, 
and put with twice or thrice its quantity of new 
milk, with hot water added to raise the tempera¬ 
ture to about 100 degrees Fahrenheit; then thor¬ 
oughly stirred until the fusion of the cream with 
the new milk and water is perfect, and when so, 
poured and stirred into the whole mass together. 
By this time the skimmed last night’s milk is ad¬ 
ded to the new morning’s milk in the vat, and 
heated up to about 90 degrees to receive the ren¬ 
net. In the degree of heat some of our best 
dairymen differ. They fix it at 80 to 92 degrees, 
each practising on his own rule, which is proba¬ 
bly settled by each in his own experience in his 
own cheese house, and on his own farm, as the 
most suitable point. 
ABOUT THE RENNET. 
Having got to the introduction of that essen¬ 
tial article to the milk, a word or two about its 
preparation. Rennet is simply the stomach of 
the calf, which may be one to six weeks old, 
when killed, and the stomach taken out—having 
been full fed by sucking the cow before killing. 
The calf should be in a perfectly healthy condition. 
(An unhealthy rennet will spoil a tun of cheese in 
quick time.) When the calf is killed and dressed, 
which should be from one to two hours after 
sucking, the stomach should be partially opened 
and emptied of the ready made curd within it. 
That is nature’s curd, made by the gastric juice 
contained in the coats of the stomach operating 
on the newly drawn milk, and thus, by curding it, 
fitting it for sustenance to the calf. So the ren¬ 
net acts in the same way upon the milk in the 
cheese tub. 
When the calf’s stomach is emptied of the curd, 
as clean as may be, but neither scraped nor rinsed, 
it should be well salted inside, and then be 
stretched on a stick bent to its shape, and hung 
up and dried until the next year, when it may be 
used. Recollect all this time, that a damp, or a 
moldy rennet is good for nothing but to spoil milk. 
When about to put the rennet to the milk it 
should be prepared after this fashion : To a gal¬ 
lon of blood-warm water put in one, or two ren¬ 
nets, according to their size. Some cheese mak¬ 
ers put 2$- small rennets to a gallon. Let them 
soak for a sufficient time to become soft; then 
churn, or rub them thoroughly, so as to get out 
all their strength, or curdling quality, if possible. 
If the strength is not all out when taken from the 
liquors, salt, stretch, and dry them again, as be¬ 
fore, and they will serve another future purpose 
of the kind. Now, dissolve as much clean, pure 
salt in this rennet liquor as it will hold in solu¬ 
tion ; strain it clean from all sediment, and set it 
away for use, in a stone jar, tightly covered and 
kept cool. Some people put in spices, as cloves 
and cinnamon to give it flavor, and excite its ac¬ 
tion when put into the milk for running up the 
curd ; but we have serious doubts whether such 
stimulating ingredients are of any good service. 
If any scum rises upon it when thus set away, let 
it be taken off before any of the liquor is used. 
The preparation should be made two or three 
weeks before it is wanted for cheese-making. 
The quantity of rennet preparation to the milk 
is somewhat variable, but the average may be 
about a gill and-a-half, or a good sized tea-cupful, 
to 20 gallons of milk, which will run the milk into 
a firm and compact curd in 40 to 50 minutes. It 
is as well to say here, that if annatto, or any other 
foreign coloring ingredient is to be Added, it should 
be mixed and poured in with the rennet, so as to 
give it a thorough infusion throughout the entire 
ma-ss. Sage juice, to which some people are par¬ 
tial for giving their cheese the peculiar flavor of 
that herb, should be added after the curd is ready 
for pressing—sprinkled in and mixed, thus giving 
it the cloudy, or striated appearance, which lov¬ 
ers of sage cheese admire. 
FURTHER WORKING OF THE CHEESE-TUB. 
The rennet now thrown in, a gentle stirring of 
the mass to incorporate it well together, and the 
heat still kept up, the curd at the proper time will 
be found perfectly made, and separated from the 
whey. The whey must be drawn within half an 
inch or so of the bottom, by a faucet strainer at 
one side of the tub in the bottom. The curd is 
then cut through and through perpendicularly and 
horizontally, with curd knives, into pieces about 
half an inch square. When sufficiently cut, the 
curd is thrown carefully into a heap in the cen¬ 
ter of the tub, and allowed to drain and settle for 
about 20 minutes ; or the curd may be put into 
a cheese strainer set in a cheese basket over the 
tub on a rack made for (hat purpose, to let out the 
whey, as may be most convenient. 
When so drained, the curd is to he put back 
into the vat or tub, the drawn whey again re¬ 
turned to it, and a scalding heat of 100 or 104 
degrees to cook it thoroughly for pressing should 
be now raised. During this process a gentle and 
steady stirring with curd knives by a rotary mo¬ 
tion of the curd and whey should be kept up, 
that every part be cut fine, and cooked, or cured 
alike. This process is to be continued until the 
curd assumes an elastic consistence, and breaks 
toughly with a creaking sort of noise while in the 
fingers. The whey is then to be drawn off, the 
curd gradually drained and cooled, and when the 
hand can freely work in it, the salt is to be ap¬ 
plied at the rate of one pound for 30 to 33 pounds 
of raw curd, which will leave about one pound of 
salt to 38 according to some—for cheese makers 
differ in this—or 40 pounds of curd, when in the 
cheese —a small cheese of 20 to 30 pounds requir¬ 
ing a trifle more salt proportionally than a large 
one of 50 to 100 pounds. The salt being well 
worked into the curd, the whole mass should be 
left to cool. 
When perfectly cooled, the curd is ready to 
press. A clean linen strainer, often cleansed in 
lye, is then placed within the hoop on the table 
of the press, into which the curd is ladled, the 
strainer carefully folded over it, and the press 
slowly, and gradually, yet strongly letdown upon 
it from 3 to 6 hours according to the size. It is 
then turned and heavily pressed again for 24 
hours, when it is to be taken out, bandaged, and 
carefully laid on the shelf in the cheese room. 
It will thus be seen that in a dairy of any magni¬ 
tude where cheeses are daily made, two presses 
will be required, as every part of this most im¬ 
portant process must be critically and thoroughly 
done. Temperature, dryness, and moisture each 
affect more or less the consistency and quali¬ 
ty of the article, while undergoing the various 
elaborations of its manufacture. 
As to the weight of the pressure to be applied 
before the turning and immediately on the laying 
•into the hoop of the curd, it is to be both rapid 
and heavy enough to gently press out the whey, 
without crushing out with it the salt, and essen¬ 
tial oil (creams) of the curd, which are indispen¬ 
sable to the preservation of the consistency and 
flavor of the cheese. When the whey is expelled, 
and the cheese turned, almost any amount 
of pressure may be applied before the new 
cheese gets a rind, which would retain the whey, 
if any were left in the cheese. The rennet, having 
performed its office of coagulation, passes off in 
its dissolved state with the whey. As it is of a 
decomposing nature, it would be a pernicious 
element if retained in the cheese, giving it a pun¬ 
gent and foetid taste, with a puffy consistence. 
The cheese being pressed, is now bandaged. 
This band consists of a piece of stout white cot¬ 
ton cloth drawn tightly around its circumference, 
lapping on to its top and bottom a couple of inches, 
more or less, and secured by stitches of thread. 
It is then to be laid on broad shelves in a room of 
high temperature, natural or artificial, (according 
to the state of the weather outside) of about 80 
degrees. Here, then, with a daily rubbing over 
with an oil, or unguent made for the purpose, as 
we shall hereafter describe, and turning, it is left 
to ripen and prepare for the market. 
Although we have given the chief processes of 
getting the milk into cheese in this article, many 
collateral items have to be added which will be 
considered in the next number. 
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Prayer prevails against temptation. 
