Hi All, Following on from Ivan's webinar, I am looking for advice on cook time/temp for our semi-hard cheeses. We have based our recipe on the standard Comte process but it has been challenging ge...

Hi All, As part of the response to Luke's question on the Webinar last week, Ivan mentioned staged pressing as being one of the possible solutions to this problem. I understand the need for three...

Thankyou Paul and Burke for your input on this. Burke, yes this is something I've heard Ivan talking about also - will give it another go at some stage with a test cheese. Cheers Luke. 

@Nimbin Valley Dairy Thank you. I chased up the DPI case studies on Pecora and The Pines Dairy. It was an interesting read as they described the same power issues we curently have, with an unreliab...

Hi all, Was wondering if anyone might be willing to share what they have chosen to use as the surfacing on internal walls of their make room/s. How have you found it to perform over time? Are you ...

I have no experience with single phase Georgia, but I think you should also investigate solar/battery storage. From memory Pecora dairy did some work there. 

Hi all, Excited to be a new member of the ASCA community! We are in the planning stage of our cheese business and looking at options of power supply, and whether to maintain single phase grid con...

I've never done this, or even heard about this.  

No I haven't tried that, but have heard Ivan talking about it. I've heard that while the sanitising effect of the peroxide is neautralised or evaporates quickly, the acidic pH remains. This might h...

@Nimbin Valley Dairy thanks for the reply Paul, appreciate it 🙏. Interesting you say that, it is time consuming. On a similar topic then, do either of you ever dose sterilise the brine (Ie hyd...

@Prom Country Cheese A Brandon thankyou for the Reply Burke, much appreciated 🙏

We don't add calcium either.  Only when making new brine.  we are thinking of moving away from pasteurising brine and just making up a new batch - less work for us. 

I don't. I believe the form of calcium in old brine would be heat-stable for the purpose required.

Hi all, just wondering if anyone who pasteurises their brine can tell me if they then add calcium back in afterwards?  cheers, Luke. 

Hi Paul, I used to get copies of any chat send to my email inbox but am not getting them anymore? Don't think I've changed any settings 

Hi all - we really want to get this technical forum happening - but it doesn't seem to have wings... could I get some feedback from people just to cofirm that members are receiving these automated ...

Salt: which salt do you use in your cheesemaking (brand, type, price, do you buy it direct or via distributor)? At Long Paddock Cheese, we mainly use salt for brine, with a smaller quantity ap...

Hi.  After the past few months of less than optimal sales we are reviewing our costs.  We currently buy rennt from Cheeselinks.  Are there any other suppliers in Australia who supply...

Hi all - based on the Standa webinar on Tuesday evening I am thinking I would like to play around with adding some propionic bacteria to my soft cheese to add some sweet flavour notes.  Does a...

Hi all, I have recently started pressing my semi hard cheeses more firmly (using a press, used to just stack them with a weight on top). I use standard hoops with cheesecloth and have found that o...