Baby Cheeses Update: Here Comes the Bourbon

So I’ve reached the end of my first week caring for my baby cheeses… and what a hoot it has been!

As you may remember, I’ve got my Camemberts in two different setups: the cooler, and the (too-cold) fridge.

My cooler cheeses are pretty happy.  They’re developing their rind of bloomy white mold on both sides, and I’ve even bought a digital hygrometer to measure humidity.  I’m aiming for 85-90% and am getting about 84%, so I’m still working on it.  But my ice system is working well to keep the temperature around 11-15°C  (and I’m aiming for 12-14°C), so I’m pretty happy… and down to twice a day ice replacements!

They’ve gone from looking like this on both sides:

To looking like this on one side:

And this on the other side:

You can see the bloomy white mold is getting all the way around the cheese:

My fridge cheeses are developing their white bloomy mold much more slowly, and are looking pretty homely.

I’m using two of them for a bourbon-flavoured experiment. I’ve made a brine of salt, water, and bourbon (6.68 oz salt : 900 ml water : 3.6 Tablespoons bourbon, if you’re interested), and I am applying it to two cheeses.

One cheese is getting rubbed with the Bourbon Brine, using a cheesebrush:

And one cheese is now wrapped in Bourbon Brine-soaked cheesecloth:

I’m off to class this afternoon, and excited to talk with my fellow Curd Nerds about their first week as affineurs (people who age cheeses).  And Louise is bringing Tomme, so it’ll be a pretty tasty afternoon.