Learn how to make Farmhouse Cheddar cheese at home bu=y following our easy step by step recipe.
Farmhouse Cheddar is a more rustic version of traditional Cheddar and is made with the exclusion of the traditional cheddaring process of stacking and milling.
Farmhouse cheddar tends to be slightly drier and crumblier than traditional Cheddar but still has a full and sharp flavour.
Farmhouse Cheddar Cheese Ingredients
- 10 litres of whole cows milk
- 1/4 tsp of mesophilic starter
- 5mls Rennet diluted in 50mls boiled and cooled water
- 1 tablespoon cheese salt
How To Make Farmhouse Cheddar Cheese
- Heat milk to 32c
- Add culture and stir thoroughly
- Cover and leave to ripen for 1 hour
- Add diluted Rennet, stir in thoroughly
- Leave to set for 45 minutes – 1 hour, until you have a clean break
- Carefully cut curds into .5 cm cubes
- Heat curds to 38c slowly over 30 minutes. This means raising the temperature no more than 1c every 5 minutes.
- Stir frequently during this time to stop the curds matting together.
- Leave the curds to rest for 5 minutes
- Tip the curds into a cheese cloth lined colander
- Knot the cloth and hang to drain the curds for 1 hour
- Put curds into a large bowl and break up into small pieces, approximately 2cm x 2cm
- Mix the broken up curd with the salt
- Pour curds into mold and press at 10kg for 10 minutes
- Remove, unwrap, turn and redress and press at 15kg for 10 minutes
- Remove, unwrap, turn and redress and press at 30kg for 12 hours
- Remove, unwrap and air dry at room temperature for 1 week until a dry surface rind has formed
- Wax and then store for aging
Aging Farmhouse Cheddar
Farmhouse cheddar can be eaten after just 1 months aging.
See Also
Rennet For Cheese Making: Everything You Need To KnowThe Best Cheeses for BurgersWhat Is The Most Difficult Cheese To Make?The Cheddar Encyclopedia: Facts about Cheddar CheeseCheck out how cheddar is made on much bigger scale than home cheese making, at the Cheddaring Process blog post.
Do you have any questions or comments about how to make Farmhouse Cheddar? Join the discussion over at the Curd Nerd Forum. We would love to hear from you!
