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amateur cheese, animal rennet, ayrshire milk, calf rennet, camembert, cheese, cheese making, diy, ewe rennet, food, guernsey milk, jersey milk, kid rennet, lamb rennet, local, natural rennet, organic, raw milk, salt, sea salt, urban cheese, vegetarian rennet
In my previous post Rennet Type Experiments – The Background, I detailed six different types of rennet I would use in an experiment to see which rennet produced the best flavoured cheese.
I stuck to my tried-and-tested camembert recipe, but instead of using my usual goat milk, I decided to try out a combination of unpasteurised Ayrshire and Guernsey milk which is available from Blackheath Farmer’s Market on a Sunday from Redlays Farm.
Home cheese making equipment
As with the previous experiments which have required separate vats (for example, when looking at what type of milk to use for cheese), I divided my vat into six separate compartments, which would each be coagulated using a different type of rennet.
Different types of rennet
From left to right: vegetarian rennet, animal rennet, premium animal rennet, calf rennet, lamb rennet, kid rennet. Note how the rennet pastes are cloudier than their liquid counterparts.
Each rennet had instructions for use on the side of the bottle, which were almost identical. I thought this was quite odd, as I’ve noticed in the past that vegetarian rennet is required in higher volumes than animal rennet, but I followed the instructions regardless. One notable difference was that the calf, lamb and kid rennet were all in “paste” form, rather than the yellow liquid I would usually associate with rennet.
Vegetarian rennet set
Each vat was heated to 30C then a small pinch of DVI starter, geotrichum candidum and penicillium candidum was added. 30 minutes later I added 0.04% rennet (0.8ml) diluted in three times the amount of water. Based on previous experiments into how much rennet to use, this should have given a “clean break” in 90 minutes. There was a marked difference in set strength after this time, as shown by the vegetarian rennet set above, which was quite weak and soft.
Generic animal rennet set
The generic animal rennet showed a good clean break, splitting easily over my finger.
Premium animal rennet set
Premium animal rennet didn’t give as good a set as the generic animal rennet, with the curd splitting up inconsistently in places.
Calf rennet set
The calf rennet surprisingly didn’t give that strong a set either, with the break not being entirely clean across my finger.
Lamb rennet set
The lamb rennet set was perfect. Moving my finger through the curd caused a completely clean split through the curd, with almost no residue.
Kid rennet set
Likewise the kid rennet set was just as good, if not better than the lamb rennet. No residue whatsoever, and a lovely split.
Curd draining
The curd was ladelled out into two sets of numbered moulds and left to drain naturally for a day.
Drained curd
At this stage, the curd was dry salted with 2.6% Cornish Sea Salt, and left to dry for a couple of days before being placed in a cheese cave to mature.
Rennet yield
There was a noticeable difference in yield from each rennet type, with vegetarian and calf producing the lowest yield, and lamb and kid producing the highest. I would imagine this is a function of the set strength, since a softer curd would naturally lead to higher whey loss during ladelling and draining.
The tasting results of the experiment will be posted shortly!
Reblogged this on wedgeintheround and commented:
Great journal of how rennet affects results.
Good work. Been waiting for your results. Thanks for sharing your work. /Rick
Yes Good Work, I am looking to change where I get my rennet, and they have kid and lamb rennet, I know know what my choice will be. Have you ever tried powdered rennet?
Thanks for the comments!
No I haven’t tried powdered rennet. I’ve seen tablets though, but never got round to trying them. Presumably you rehydrate them first?
They supplier that I want to go through has the powdered rennet, you would only use about 1/8 tsp and rehydrate in distilled water. It has a longer shelf life than the liquid version. I have tried vegetarian rennet and I found it produced a bitter after taste in the cheese. In longer ageing cheese it mellows.
Ah makes sense – have only had one bottle of rennet “go off” when I wasn’t making so frequently a couple of years back.
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