Any Guy's Food Blog

Current Inventory:

1 lb Muenster (Ready 1/22)
3 oz White Cheddar (To be aged 1 year)
1 lb Brie (Ready at the end of January)
1 lb Chipotle Cheddar (For my mother's birthday 1/10)
1 lb Monterrey Jack
1 lb Bleu du Queyras
1 lb Failed Cheddar - This is that wheel that started off wrong. It has now been cross-contaminated by other cultures because I left town and forgot to get it covered appropriately and had a few issues with the cave. So I'll be the only one exposed to the final product.)

The Brie is an interesting situation because I didn't get it quite firm enough before pulling it our of the mold. So when I set it out to slow drying in the humidity of the cave, it broke apart. The other issue was just the sheer size of the Brie. The good thing is that I learned while making this most recent Bleu that I should have just kept it in the mold a little longer to let it firm up a little more. So I'll remember that on the next Brie.

Tasting notes:

I pulled out two cheddars over this holiday break. I also tasted two small brie wheels a week or two before that. The first two were particularly small because I just made a smaller batch since I didn't know what I was doing and felt particularly intimidated. Now I know that brie is wicked easy and have been improving some other areas.

The first of the two wheels of brie was saltier than I could really deal with. The main reason for this was the size. The wheels were so small that the rind made up a large fraction of the entire cheese. Thus the amount of salt in the rind, which was unavoidable, was too much for the small amount of total cheese. Otherwise, it had a nice sort of bitter taste to it. It was a little too firm, but had a decent stink to it.

The second wheel was consumed a week or so after. It was enough time to mature the flavor a little more. For some reason the salt in the rind was less noticeable. Overall I was very happy with the brie the second time around. But I learned from those first ones to go a little bigger, be a little more careful with the salting process and to be PATIENT.

Second brie at cream into the mix and went for a full pound wheel. This will come with plenty of notes on this new wheel, some of which I already mentioned.

The first cheddar I pulled out was 2 months old. It was an appetizer at my brother's engagement party. I liked it quite a bit. Homemade cheddar is obviously better than regular store-bought. It's cheaper than artisan cheeses usually. I was pleased with the taste. A simple cheddar with a sharpness between mild and medium. I'd say that the rind was medium, the middle was a little less than medium. I learned that I definitely want to develop my rinds much more fully on the cheddars. I like the sharpness. I found myself picking through the dish for rind pieces throughout the night. But overall I was pleased.

The second cheddar that I tried was just shy of 2 month. However, it wasn't aged in my cave. After waxing, we kept it in my girlfriend's fridge. It seemed that the lower temperature of the refrigerator kept it from maturing as fast. For this reason it was an extremely mild cheddar. I wasn't terribly excited about. But it was good and other guests that tried it gave it many compliments.