Milch Cows and Dairy Farming / Comprising the Breeds, Breeding, and Management, in Health and Disease, of Dairy and Other Stock, the Selection of Milch Cows, with a Full Explanation of Guenon's Method; The Culture of Forage Plants, and the Production of Milk, Butter, and Cheese: Embodying the Most Recent Improvements, and Adapted to Farming in the United States and British Provinces. With a Treatise upon the Dairy Husbandry of Holland; To Which Is Added Horsfall's System of Dairy Management

by Charles Louis Flint

The skim-milk is poured from the milk-pans into large tubs, and allowed to stand quiet till the cheesy matter has settled to the bottom, which requires, perhaps, half a day. Then the thin liquid on top is poured off very carefully, without stirring up the rest, through a strainer, into a large brass kettle, till it is full; but the thicker substance at the bottom is left, and not put into the kettle. Under this kettle a fire is made, and the milk heated to a certain degree, regulated by the judgment of the dairymaid, sufficient to warm other cold milk, but it must not boil. The fire is made in the kitchen, or in the summer-house, or in some other room called the cheese-house. When the milk in the kettle is properly heated, it is poured into the tub of milk which has been heated and allowed to get cold. This tub is an upright vat, open at the top, of uniform diameter, bound with wooden hoops, and generally left of the natural color of the wood; scoured very bright, but sometimes painted blue and the hoops black. It is seen in [Fig. 120].

When the quantity of milk is large, the dairyman puts in as much rennet as he thinks necessary to curdle the milk completely; but before and during the addition of the curd the whole is thoroughly stirred, and this stirring is continued until the stick or wooden ladle used for the purpose will stand erect in the curd. Then the dairy-woman works the curd with her hands till no further effect of the rennet in curding the milk is to be seen. It is called the cheese-curd.

The rennet is prepared in the following manner: The maw or fourth stomach of a newly-killed sucking calf is taken from the other stomachs, carefully cleaned and cut into strips two inches wide, and then hung up in the chimney to be smoked and dried; or, in hot weather in summer, it is hung up in the sun. Well smoked and dried strips will keep a very long time. When these are wanted for use, they are very carefully washed and purified, and then laid in the salt brine from the butter-barrels, or in lukewarm salt water to soak. The liquid is put into bottles and laid in the cellar. For curding milk as much is taken as is thought to be necessary, which cannot be determined without considerable practice and experience. If too little is taken, the cheese is not fat enough; if more than the right quantity, it gives a disgusting acid taste. It is difficult, almost impossible, to state exactly how much rennet should be used with a certain quantity of milk, because this must be determined by its quality and its strength. Something like the following quantity is, however, taken: In a sixty-quart vat are placed about fifty rennets, prepared by drying, washing, and cutting, and a clear salt brine or butter-pickle of twenty to twenty-five degrees strength is added. In smaller quantities the proportion of rennet is about one and a half quarts to a rennet, or even less. This dried maw can be bought everywhere in packages of twenty-five pieces each.

Fig. 121.

One great point in cheese-making is to have a sufficient quantity of good rennet in store; for the older it grows the more powerful and effective it becomes, and the experienced cheese-makers, studying their own interests, know very well how difficult, hurtful, and time-wasting, it is to use fresh or new rennet. The assertion sometimes made that they use muriatic acid instead of rennet for curding the milk in Holland rests on an error, at least so far as the present methods are concerned. In earlier times, and for the poorest kinds, as the Jews’ cheese, muriatic acid was more or less used. At the present time, the rennet for those cheeses is prepared from the stomachs of calves some days old.

When the curd has sufficiently come, and has all been thoroughly broken, the dairy-woman puts a four-cornered linen cloth, called the cheese-cloth, which is used only for this purpose, and is only loosely woven, upon a small strong ladder laid over the edges of a low tub, and puts upon the cloth the proper quantity of curd, then ties up the four corners of the cloth, and presses with her whole strength, that the milk may drain off. This work is also done by men who can apply great strength, [Fig. 121]. The corners of the cheese-cloth are brought together, and the operator presses as hard as he can, in order to remove all the milk from the curd. But, as this is not possible with the hands alone, the whole is placed under a plank-press, and by this means as much of the milk as possible is pressed out. A strong cleat is nailed to a pillar in the wall at a convenient height from the floor,—say two feet,—so that the tub, ladder, and cheese-cloth, can be put under the plank, when the plank is pressed down upon the cloth and curd. At the other end of the plank the operator sits and presses down with the whole weight of his body, as seen in [Fig. 122]. The whey runs into the tub, and is generally used as food for swine. The pressure is continued till no more runs off.

Fig. 122.

After the complete removal of the whey, the curd remaining in the cloth has the form of the palms of the hands, and is pressed so firmly that it holds together when the cloth is removed. But it is again broken up, and put for this purpose into the breaking-tub, a low but broad, open tub, with wooden hoops, and made of strong staves, and is here worked over by the bare but cleanly-washed feet of the dairyman, or hired man. This working with the feet is continued, just as in kneading dough, till all is brought to a stiff paste.