Today was our first day getting to grips with the practical side of the course, on our Introduction to Dairy! =)

Lee-Anna is the head coordinator for the Dairy minor, & is also a former student of the School, & she took us through our first day.   We started off with a huge vat of milk, fresh off the farm yesterday & chilled overnight with some starter cultures.

The group split into pairs & Lee-Anna heated the milk back up to 25-30oC.  Each pair then got 5 litres of milk, into which was added 1.5ml of Marzyme (the rennet); the mix was stirred & left to do it's thing =)

We were allowed to sneak a peak every now & then, to check on the progress of our milk.  What were looking for was a separation of the curds & whey, which I'll come to a little later =)

While we were waiting for the curds & whey to separate, we had a milk tasting.  We were given a sheet listing 9 different sorts of milk, including skimmed, whole goats milk, soya milk & a raw whole milk.  Samples of each were in jugs, labelled A - I, & we split into groups to try & work out which was which.

Some milks, like the soya & skimmed, were really easily identified.  The goats milk jumped out a mile, it had a very distinctive smell & flavour, much stronger than cows milk, it was quite clearly a goats milk (I actually thought it was quite nice, a lot of the other students were less convinced!)  Our team got most of the answers right, but the three whole milks confused us & we got them mixed up, but never mind =)

After the milk tasting we went for lunch; today there were jacket potatoes with either a beef chilli or three bean chilli, soured cream, grated cheese & salad leaves.  The food here really is a highlight, it's so tasty & filling! 

After lunch, we went back to our milk, which had separated nicely into curds & whey. 

 

The curds had coagulated into a disc, with the whey visible around the edge of the disc.  We had the opportunity to get our hands in to have a feel of it; it was surprisingly warm, & the curds had a soft, almost spongy feel to them.  It really reminded me of soggy bread!  

Using long knives, we sliced through the curds in a grid pattern, then on a diagonal slant, to break them up.  We then ladled the mix into prepared cheese moulds, topping them up once the whey had drained away; quite a laborious process, especially as we had to keep emptying the whey from the bottom of the tray before it overflowed!

So pretty!  We set the cheeses aside in order to get down to our epic cheese tasting!

We had 9 cheeses to taste (only 8 are in the picture above though), ranging from the lovely Stichelton, an unpasteurised cows milk blue cheese made locally on the Estate, to the Childwickbury, a pasteurised goats milk cheese, only a week old!  My favourites of the bunch were the Childwickbury, the Stichelton & the Cardo, another unpasteurised goats cheese, but firmer than the Childwickbury, & slightly salty. 

After the cheese tasting, we set about making some butter =D

We took 800ml of double cream & poured it into a mixer.  Starting with a slow speed, we gradually increased it until, eventually, the cream had separated into butter & buttermilk.  It really is so simple!

We then sieved the contents of the mixing bowl, to drain off the buttermilk.  Afterwards, we had to squeeze & rinse the butter, to get out as much of the buttermilk as possible.  Then, we weighed out our butter.  We ended up with 442g of butter & decided not to add any salt, so we were able to get straight down to beating the butter with the butter pats!

By the time we had finished with the butter, our cheeses had set enough to allow us to turn them, which involved lifting them out of the moulds, peeling off the blue cheese cloth, & literally turning the cheese over, before wrapping back up & placing back in the moulds =)

We were able to bring our butter home today, but the cheeses will need further time to set & mature.  We were also able to bring home some of the left over whey & the buttermilk, for use in home baking.  I've never used whey before, but apparently it can be used in soda bread, so I might have to have an experiment! =D

Sadly, we didn't have time to go visit the goats, but there will definately be a day on the farm with them on the Dairy minor, so I'm happy =)

It's been a great day, my favourite so far, & I am now quite sure that I want to do the Dairy minor, so I'm quite looking forward to getting back in the training room, & into the dairy!