making what's her name

On September 8, 2010 I made my first batch of "what's her name" with raw milk, all by myself. It was a bit intimidating to do since I had to follow Joel's note keeping ex:
My dad brought me milk from a raw milk farm and, yes, you walk into the cooler take your milk and leave $4.50/ gallon in the box.... gotta love small towns. I followed the recipe pretty well and everything went smoothly. It was fun having Joel's aunt there to help, too. While I am tending Bleu boy he is tending "what's her name" in California. He let her age a few weeks and get covered in mold-













He then gives her a salt water cleaning & vinegar bath-













He rotates her every day and will rotate the salt & vinegar rubs-

These salt & vinegar rubs enhance the cheese flavor while keeping the mold to a minimum. It also helps develop a good rind, which will hopefully keep the cheese moisture in. We will be eating her around Christmas time which will make her almost 5 months old, which is the longest aging we have done thus far. We will also be taking her to our 2nd annual Rocky Mountain Dairy Sheep meeting. It will be held in Logan this year and I get to help with the catering. Very fun!

bleu cheese- 12 days old

Well our bleu baby is very interesting. We don't quite know how he's going to turn out. We didn't follow the recipe exactly... we added less of the Penicillium Roqueforti and added the Roquefort cheese itself. So it isn't really looking like the pictures from the recipe. I guess this is what we call "live and learn". We will do a few things differently next time such as cut smaller cubes or even mash the curd up by hand just to make sure the gaps aren't too big. The most important part of cheese making is of course, taste which we can't determine for another...50-90 days. But once you open that lid the smell hits you and makes you want to take a bite of it, it is amazing.

bleu cheese- 9 days old

The bleu is well on its way. How pretty! I will be piercing thin holes into it tomorrow which will stimulate the growth of the bleu mold. Anywhere there is access to air the bleu will grow.
This is an aging cave in France where they age the Roquefort Bleu Cheese and wow... so we have our work cut out for us.
This image comes from Hotel Cap Vert Saint Affrique, Roquefort France. If you are ever in the area please stop by and see the caves. One day Joel & I will go... I am sure of it.

Les grands classiques
Entre le mythique Viaduc de Millau qui s'élance vers le ciel et les légendaires Caves de Roquefort et leurs mystérieuses fleurines, classées site remarquable du goût, l'Aveyron oscille entre modernité et tradition.

I took one year of french in High school and 2 semesters of it in college so I will translate this for you.

The Grand Classics,
Enter the mystic viaduct of Millau ..um..something-something.... the legendary caves of Roquefort .. lets see here... um... mysteries ...what? uh.... classes a remarkable ...something or other.... something else... ok so basically that's it.

bleu cheese- 5 days old

Into day 5 and it is looking good so far but since it is our first bleu we really have no idea if its really looking good or if we are fooling ourselves, either way we are having fun trying. I removed the block from the mould and set it in the pot to age for the next 60-90 days. Now the temperature in our basement is perfect- it stays a nice 55-60 degrees and the humidity is around 85-90%.

I set in limestone rocks just to see if anything happens. I am sure it needs to have more limestone surrounding it but this is all I could fit in the pot. I still have to flip it every day so hopefully we will see some mold start to grow in the next few weeks.

bleu cheese- 4 days old

Well she is now 4 days old. She held together very well and as you can see she has kept her cube like features though they stick together. There should be holes throughout in order for the bleu mold to grow.


Very exciting.

OUR FIRST BLEU CHEESE!!

As most of you know our entire cheese journey began with wanting to make the best bleu cheese in town. We have been patient and tried our hand with several other cheeses and getting lots of practice with "What's her name", Queso fresco, Juustoleipä, Cheddar and the infamous "chocolate milk trial". Though we feel very comfortable with our cheese making skills bleu was something we wanted to do together and with us being apart more often than together it has just had to wait. Joel and the kids came for our first Thanksgiving holiday and we thoroughly enjoyed every second we were together and one day we saw my dad at the Malt Shop and he threw out the challenge, "Do you guys want me to get you some raw milk to make cheese?" Our minds first went to "Na, that's ok- don't know where we'd find the time." But by the next day we were ready and decided bleu was the next cheese to be aged in our little cheese fridge. This process is very similar to every other type of cheese just some tweeking. There is the heating of the milk, then adding the cultures only this time we added the Penicillium Roqueforti AND actual Roquefort bleu cheese. We took about 1 Tablespoon of the cheese and smashed it into the milk then added it to the pot. We added the rennet and then cut the curd. After which we allowed the curds to sit as they released more whey then drained the whey. Then we set the curds in the moulds to set for 24 hours. We had to keep then at about 55 degrees so our basement was the perfect spot. As you can tell, we have a limestone basement which we will try and use to age the cheese and gain that bacterial flavor that is only mastered with limestone. As far as we know, no one has used the Oolite Limestone for aging bleu so it will be very exciting to see what comes of it. 24 hours we then cut the curd again into half inch cubes and added 6 tablespoons of salt. Yes, 6. We then placed them back to the mould and this time they all fit into the large mould. As more whey is expelled the smaller and firmer the curds get. We placed a 10lb. weight on top to aid in the pressing. The next few weeks are going to consist of flipping the cheese once a day then we will place the cheese in the fridge and let the magic begin.

I will keep you posted.

my first painting done in utah

It has been a while since I have picked up the brush but I have been inspired ever since we moved here to try my first sheep painting. I had to find the perfect sheep to photograph and see what I could get. We are so fortunate to have such great new friends here. The second week here I met a great couple, Dane & Beth Thurston. Beth approached me and we began talking, she had heard that we were interested in sheep for the purposes of cheese making and then told me that they had 5 Icelandic sheep on their property as a hobby. Well she told her hubby about our plans and he quickly approached me and said, "We need to talk." Well that led to dinner at their house when Joel was in town and I was able to take some great photos of his adorable sheep. His sheep are like pets to them. one ram actually comes to greet you and you must give him lots of attention, just like a dog, if you don't he will ram you. Needless to say, they are gorgeous animals. We were there talking sheep for hours. I could barely pull Joel & Dane apart they were having so much fun talking. I snapped this shot as Joel was petting him and fell in love with the image- I knew this was the image I was waiting for. If we can get things going we would love to buy this ram but of course, like everything else, it all takes time & patience.We have had great interest in the Icelandic sheep to sell for meat. They are extremely tender and considered a gourmet product but we won't bring that up at this point because they are so cute.

-dedicated to my sweet adorable husband Joel, keep your eye on the prize.