Calcium Chloride

[saucisson]

Dave,

I'm not too sure what you're meaning here!
Are you referring to the quality of the milk?
I immediately thought that if any milk, be it cows, goat, sheep or any thing else, if it is homogenised you need Calcium Chloride to assist with the clotting of the curds.
Am I barking up the wrong tree here?

Lindsay.

I meant that you need a certain amount of Calcium in the milk to achieve a clean break and I'm not aware that homogenisation would make any difference, but as always, I am more than happy to find out that I am wrong

Dave

[Divey]

I have recieved my goodies now and what I can report is that the little sachets of cultures are Freeze-dried Cultures for Direct Vat Set (DVS) which means they are designed to go straight into the milk and stirred.
The weight of the contents are 50 micrograms (50u) which is enough to treat 250 litres of milk.
Now, I don't know of too many home cheesmakers who are going to rush into making cheese starting with 250 litres of milk
I would imagine that most would be commencing with 8 - 10 litres which means I should split this tiny amount of Culture into about 25 equal parts which would allow direct pitching into 10 litres of milk.
I have a good friend who is a Pharmacist. I shall test his scales out today.
I already have some little sterile vials that would be ideal to store the culture.

Lindsay.

[BlueCheese]

u dont realy need to do that, I just use a very small pinch and make a small starter then add it to the batch the next day. The starter will have plenty of enzymes to do your batch.

[Divey]

But if I do do that it means I don't have to make a starter which seems a lot easier to me.