Latest / Everyday Ancestral with James Barry / Cheesemaking Is Fancy Composting: Why Milk Wants to Transform with Robyn Jackson

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Cheesemaking Is Fancy Composting: Why Milk Wants to Transform with Robyn Jackson · Everyday Ancestral with James Barry

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It's so important that we learn at least a little bit of the skill of
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cheese making on our homesteads or inner communities because we don't want it become a lost arch.
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We want to preserve all of these traditions that are lost already and so we don't want to lose
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the ones that we're finding. Welcome back to everyday ancestral. I'm your host James Barry. I'm
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really excited about this next guest. I only met Robin Jackson of cheese from scratch at the
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Modern Homesteading Conference just this year in 2024. Robin is a mom of three children,
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a rancher's wife, a homesteader, and a milkmaid. She's been milking a cow and making cheese in
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her kitchen since 2014. Teaching others through her business cheese from scratch since 2021.
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So since launching her business, Robin has taught thousands of students. She is passionate about
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not only teaching the skill of cheese making but educating people about cheese as a traditional form
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of fermentation and preservation and milk and I really loved how she talked about it and she's
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definitely gotten me interested. So I hope you leave this episode wanting to try to make your own
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dairy from scratch, you know, basically your cheese. So enjoy this episode. If you like it,
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leave a comment, share it with a friend, follow us. We would love your support. Thank you again
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and enjoy this episode with Robin Jackson. I learned on the internet that Brian Colby are your favorite
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cheeses to make. So what is it about it that make those your favorite? They're such different
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cheeses, which is cool. Colby is definitely I love making it because it's the cheese that my family
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loves. So my husband Zach is originally from Wisconsin and so he loves Colby cheese. He loves
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mozzarella string cheese. He loves all those kind of traditional Wisconsin cheese state cheeses.
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And then my kids also just really love Colby. They like that. It's kind of mild and it's sort of
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tastes like the cheese that you get from the grocery store. Just like I don't want to compare it to
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craft. But you know, like it tastes like something that you would just buy at the grocery store and
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it tastes normal to them. And then I love making Bree. So Bree is like my favorite cheese ever to make.
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It's so fun to make. That's my favorite cheese probably to eat. And when you think about
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cheeses and what you've found from just your hours working with cheese and of course
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you're teaching so many people, what do you think is the kind of attracting point? What's the
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linchpin around cheese for people? Do you find its texture? Yeah, texture, the fat. It just is like
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satiating to your body. When you have a piece of cheese, it just is like, I needed that. That was
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good for me as like a homesteader or rancher kind of thing. It's a way to preserve my milk. So I
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really love it in that sense that it's a way that I can take something that's highly perishable
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and turn it into something that is going to be shelf stable almost or not quite shelf stable. But
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cold room stable basically and is going to last me for years. Yeah, I think that's really the key,
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right? I mean, this is a preservation technique. You're getting really good fat. As you mentioned,
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you're getting good protein and then of course lots of flavor. But you began cheese making
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what like 2014, is that right? Yeah, 2014, yeah. What were you doing before and then what brought
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you to cheese making? Zach and my husband and I, we've had our cattle ranch for 12 years now,
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I guess it is. And so as I said before, my husband is originally from Wisconsin. We live in Canada now.
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And so he moved with his family to Canada. I am from Canada and we met and we married and both
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of our families had cattle ranchers. We wanted to be cattle ranchers too. So we bought a cattle ranch.
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But ever since I met Zach, he's always wanted to have a dairy cow again. And he just always talked
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about it. And I kind of, I never grew up with a dairy cow. I didn't know why he was so excited
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about them. But then one day he just brought one home and he's like, can you make me some cheese?
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And at that point, I'd like been growing a garden and doing a little bit of fermenting and stuff
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like that. So it wasn't like this preposterous idea. So I was kind of excited to do it. And I just
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started turning our milk into cheese from that cow and the kind of the rest is history.
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You had never made cheese before, right? So what was your resource for learning and how did it
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grow from there? I mean, did you like it enough to say, oh, this is fun. Let me keep exploring.
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Or was it more just like, oh, I want to make my husband happy? I'm going to find my way, you know,
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a little bit of both. So I had already made, been making yogurt from store-bought milk. So I was
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already really interested in food preservation and making more things from scratch and stuff. So
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that kind of got me excited about it. I had a book that I read through. It was 200 easy homemade
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cheese recipes by Deborah Amarin Boys, who's also Canadian, actually. It was like my Bible for
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cheese making and there was a lot of trial and error. So I would say that learning curve was very,
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very steep, but it was also very exciting because even though it was steep and I had a lot of failures,
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I also had like some successes along the way early on. So that kind of just drove me to just
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keep learning and keep wanting to improve. You eventually founded cheese from scratch, which is your
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educational platform. How long did it take for you to take this interest and turn it into really
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like a career, right? I think it was three years ago that I started cheese from scratch. So I'd
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been making cheese for about seven years. I was kind of looking for a way that I could stay
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home more on the ranch. I was working in town full time at that point. So I was looking for a way
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that I could stay home on the ranch, be with my kids more. And so I was like, I've got this really
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cool hobby of cheese making. Lots of people are asking me like, how is cheese made? Can you teach me
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kind of thing? So I decided to just kind of dive into it and start teaching other people online how
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to make cheese and cheese from scratch kind of took off. I think it was a good time because there
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was a lot of people just looking to stay home more, make their own food from scratch more post COVID
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basically. So I think it was a good time to kind of start a business like that. You know, I've taught a
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lot of people how to make cheese. It's so exciting to see that people are starting to enjoy this
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really age old skill of cheese making. Hey, you're a bit unique though, right? And how you teach
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because don't you emphasize traditional cheese making? I'm a learner in traditional cheese making
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myself right now. A lot of people are learning kind of the same level as I am for traditional
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cheese making just because it's almost been lost. Like in the last hundred years cheese making
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has changed so drastically. It's almost unrecognizable to how cheese has been made for thousands of
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years. The last hundred years have just changed it all. So we're trying to get back to that how
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cheese was made before, you know, pasteurization and sterilization and freeze dried cultures that
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you're buying from the cheese supply store. So we're trying to relearn things that we've kind of
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forgotten almost. So I would say I'm definitely a learner in that area just like everybody else,
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but it's an exciting sort of journey that we're all on sort of reclaim natural cheese making.
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So the pasteurization of milk, I mean, how did that affect cheese making and what had to change
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or did anything? Pasteurization just sort of almost set like a precedent for sterilization and
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it changed everything is what what the answer to that is. At the time when pasteurization came in,
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it was a good solution to a problem that was happening. A lot of people were getting sick from
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industrialized milk, you know, industrial resolution, everything had changed in the way that we
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were raising our animals and the way that milk was being transported. And so pasteurization was
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sort of like this bandaid solution that came in and okay, if we heat our milk up to a high temperature,
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it's going to kill all of the bacteria and people aren't going to get sick because in milk that
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is not handled appropriately, there is good bacteria, but there is also bad bacteria and some of
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these bad bacteria were making people sick. And so pasteurization was that bandaid solution that
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fixed it and made it so that people weren't going to basically die. But then with that came all
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sorts of other things where now that you have changed the structure of milk, now you have to do
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different things and you're cheese making to make it successful. And so it was sort of like this
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thing that just domino effected everything in the cheese making world.
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It's interesting too because in many ways pasteurization just gave permission for poor
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inhumane, you know, dairy cow conditions or or raising of dairy cows and dealing with milk, right?
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I mean, it's it's almost like here we have this technique so it doesn't matter as much about
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all the other things because we'll just kill whatever you create. When milk is picked up from
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the dairy farm, there's an acceptable amount of somatic cell count that is in that milk. Like it's
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acceptable for that milk to be dirty because or contaminated or have these bad bacteria isn't it
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because you're just going to pasteurize it and kill it off anyway. So yeah, it is it's given
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permission for bad milk handling practices, bad animal husbandry, the breeding of animals to be
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used just for production rather than, you know, like healing the land and looking after the animals.
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And you work with both raw and store bought milk. So what do you see? Like what's the difference in
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the cheese making? Are you sort of restricted on what cheeses you can use or make with, you know,
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raw versus store bought milk? Maybe just talk about your experience with both in terms of cheese
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making. So I would consider myself mostly a raw milk cheese maker because I have dairy animals
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on my farm, you know, that's my kind of expertise. I'm very pro raw milk, pro having your own
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fresh dairy source pro being able to kind of access that but I know that that's not going to be
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something that everybody can access just because the state of how everything is. So I do teach
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pasteurized milk as well pasteurized milk can be turned into cheese, but you know, there's
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different things that you have to do to get that milk to turn to cheese. So just as an example,
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raw milk, it comes out of a cow's outer and it's perfectly designed to be turned into cheese.
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That little calf that is going to drink that milk relies on this ability of milk to turn to cheese
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to actually be able to survive. So that milk comes out of the other. It's nice and warm. It goes
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into the little calf stomach where it's also warm. It's acidic in there. There are enzymes. We know
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these enzymes called rennet and all of these things kind of combine to cause that milk to go from
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its liquid form to its solid form or its cheese form. So when we're making cheese with fresh
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raw milk, that's you know, almost straight from the adder. We are able to sort of mimic this
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natural process and that helps us to make better cheese. Whereas if you are making cheese from
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pasteurized milk, that's at the grocery store. Not only is that milk cooled, so you have to warm it
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back up to the correct temperature that kind of comes out of the adder. During the pasteurization
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process, the composition of that milk has been damaged. So there's not, you know, these natural
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good beneficial bacteria in it. There's the mineral components of it has been damaged. So you have
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to add something back in called calcium chloride to make that milk actually coagulate. A few of these
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things have to be done when you are dealing with pasteurized milk, where it's just so much easier
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if you're dealing with fresh raw milk, I would say. When you're working with the raw milk, you're
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literally taking the warm milk and making cheese straight away. Yeah, you're just like, I bring it
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in from the barn, strain it so that it's nice and clean. There's no barn debris or anything and
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put it into the cheese pot. If I have time that day, you know, I'm not opposed to putting into the
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fridge, but I try not to make cheese with milk that is older than, you know, two to three days because
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you're going to have more problems with that. So I am kind of like as much as I'm pro-raw milk,
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I'm pro-fresh raw milk. And if you don't have access to that fresh raw milk, then you should
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probably be considering dealing with pasteurized milk, but it should be like low temperature pasteurization.
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It shouldn't be ultra-pasturized or ultra-pasturized milk cannot be turned into cheese, which is
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interesting and also concerning. Say that again, high temperature milk cannot. Yeah, so ultra-pasturized
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milk, which a lot of milk actually offend in the states is ultra-pasturized. In Canada, I'm not
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much. Most of it's just low temperature pasteurization, but ultra-pasturized milk can't be turned into
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cheese. I think you're right. I think in the US, I've never seen low. It's very rare. Maybe I have
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once or twice, but it's usually ultra-pasturized. It's concerning because that won't turn to cheese.
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So if you are in the states or you're in an area where raw milk's not legal and you're having to
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rely on the grocery stores, you know, you still it's beneficial to make those connections in your
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community. Even if you're having to buy pasteurized milk from small farms around you, at least that's
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probably going to be low temperature pasteurized. If milk can still cream line, that's also a good
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indication that it's a little bit less processed. If you're listening to this and you don't really
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know what real milk is, so real milk, the cream rises to the top of raw cow's milk and you are
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able to kind of scoop it off and make your better or whatever. So if you are able to find cream
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line milk, it's probably going to be less processed. It hasn't gone through the homogenization process.
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That's a really great tip. And so what can you do with ultra-pasturized milk? Can you make yogurt?
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I mean, is there anything you could do with it? I'm 98% sure you can make yogurt. I've never
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dealt with it. I've never used it before, but yeah, I just know that you can't get it to coagulate
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with that enzyme rennet that I talked about. Rennet is something that we add during the cheese
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making process to cause quick coagulation and ultra-pasturized. Even if you add that calcium chloride
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that I talked about, it won't coagulate. Have you mess around with vegetable rennet versus animal
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and don't sell any difference? I prefer animal rennet just because I am trying to mimic that natural
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process in my cheese making. The more natural I can go basically, the better my cheeses are.
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Vegetable rennet does make good cheese, but it causes bitterness in cheeses that are aged over
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like four months, so it's better for fresh cheeses. So there's basically, you know, a couple
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different types of rennet that you can get. You can get animal rennet, which is harvested from
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young animals. So usually they're about two weeks when they're harvested. So that comes with
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its own sort of ethical things for people. And then vegetable rennet is usually coming from like
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fangs and cartoons. And thistle I think maybe feels a little bit more ethical, but you also need
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to harvest a lot more of those vegetables to be able to make a small amount of rennet, whereas
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a animal has enough rennet in its stomach to turn all of its mother's milk into cheese throughout
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her entire lactation. So there's a lot more rennet actually coming from those animal stomachs.
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And then you also have rennet that is made in labs. So it's called FCP rennet. It's not a
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genetically modified organism itself, but it's created using a genetically modified process.
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So it's neither animal nor vegetable. What is it? If you looked under a microscope,
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it looks exactly like the animal rennet. And enzyme called chymazine, that's the enzyme that
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is in the lining of young calves stomachs. But this chymazine is produced. I believe using
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like a bacteria or a fungus. So they genetically modify that organism to produce this enzyme.
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And then they kill that organism off. And then they're left with this enzyme. So it isn't really
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listed as a genetically modified product, but genetically modified organism because an enzyme can't
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be an organism, but it is created using a genetically modified process. Did you say you have work
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with it or you have not? I haven't, but it's apparently does the exact same thing as animal rennet.
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So if that's what you have available to you, it doesn't cause bitterness and cheeses that are aged
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over the four months. People that are vegetarian, I believe can use it because it's not actually
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an animal product. So those are kind of the benefits of it, I guess. Can you talk a little bit about
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the aging? Just assuming no one knows anything, like can you just talk about why and how the aging
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affects the cheese because you already are mentioning that it sounds like the longer it's aged,
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the less bitter it is, is that accurate? So just for vegetable rennet and cheeses that are aged
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over four months. So different cheeses are going to age in different ways and you're going to use
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different techniques to age different cheeses. And it all starts in the cheese pot. It starts
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at the very beginning of your cheese making not only with what bacterial culture. So just like
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if you're making any other fermented product, you're adding a bacterial culture into your milk.
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So different cultures are going to help you make different cheeses. And then the way that you
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handle your milk and the cheese pot, so how much moisture you're releasing, how much you're allowing
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it to ferment, what heats you're bringing it to, all those things are going to define aging.
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And then the actual aging process itself. And there is so it's such a vast conversation basically
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about all the different ways that you can age cheese. And maybe you can make one cheese,
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the exact same as you make another cheese, but you can age it differently. It will become an
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entirely different cheese just so much to it really. So let's talk about the bacteria used.
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Obviously it's tied to the environment as well, right? So what are the different
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bacteria? Where do they come from? I know obviously some are coming from the air,
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but maybe just talk about that process. And then in turn, the environment that then you're allowing
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the cheese to curd, how does that affect the product? So cheese making is really a lot like other
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fermentation methods. So same thing if you are using vegetable fermentation, you're relying on
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a type of bacteria called lactic bacteria. So that's this huge head category of bacteria that
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like to feed on sugar. So lactic bacteria were actually named for their love of milk because
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lactic bacteria live in raw milk. And they like to feed on the sugar, which is the lactose in
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the milk. And as a feed on that sugar, they ferment it into lactic acid and cause that fermentation.
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So that's sort of the first process of fermentation and cheese making. And there is multiple different
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stages of fermentation, but all cheeses are starting with this addition of lactic bacteria,
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and it's fermenting and acidifying the milk. So there's different types of lactic bacteria.
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You can get warm loving ones that are referred to as thermophilic. And so they're going to be used
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for cheeses where you're cooking the curds to a higher heat. And then there's the mesophilic ones,
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which are where you're cooking the curds to a lower heat. With a sourdough starter where you can
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bake all sorts of different types of bread with one starter, you can make your own cheese making
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starter. A lot of people will refer to it as collaborative culture. So it's a raw milk starter
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culture. It kind of harnesses the power of the raw milk. So instead of adding a freeze-dried
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starter culture that you're going to buy on the store, that's just one specific strain.
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These homemade cultures, they have a whole ecology of different bacteria within them. And these
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bacteria, you can isolate the ones that you want depending on your cheese making technique.
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So if you want those thermophilic bacteria, you're going to be heating your milk to a higher heat
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during the cheese making process. And that's going to encourage those ones to thrive,
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whereas if you want your mesophilic, the lower temperature ones, you're going to be heating it
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to a lower heat kind of thing. So that's something that is a little bit more advanced, but it's super
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exciting because we haven't really been talking about this for very long. There's this guy named
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David Asher. He's written a couple books now. And so he's sort of spearheading all of this
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natural cheese making thing. And we're all sort of just learning from him. But I've been making
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collaborative culture for a couple of years now. And it was almost mind blowing because before
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that I was using that freeze-dried culture. And I just kind of was like, oh, you could not make
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your own starter cultures at home. But yeah, I've been having really, really good results using
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this collaborative culture, which is very exciting. That is really exciting. So really it's truly
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like a homemade cheese, like every aspect of it is coming from your farm. Just other than the
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rennet, everything else is coming from our own farm. So before we get into the actual making of
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the cheese, I imagine there's probably some people listening that are like never going to make
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cheese. So can we just support them? And what should they be looking for when they go to the
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grocery store? And let's set the criteria as most nutritious, maybe most flavorful. And I know
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that's going to vary hugely. But maybe just pick some of your favorites. And what criteria people
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should be looking for should it be aged to certain, a minimum of a certain amount of months. And
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anything that's going to help the cheese store buyer. Yeah, I think primary first thing on the list
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would be local. You know, local, it's probably made using freeze-dried bacteria. But it's going to,
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you know, be supporting your community. If it is made with natural cultures, which I don't think
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there is any cheese making plants in North America at this moment that are using cheese making
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cultures, natural cheese making cultures. But you know, it would have the microbes from your
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community, your area on the ingredient list of your cheese. You want there to be four ingredients.
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If there's more than four ingredients, other than maybe if there's like spices or anything
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like that, you don't want to buy it. So the four ingredients that you are looking for on your
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cheese making label is your milk, your bacterial culture, your rennet and your salt. So those are
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the only four ingredients that need to be in cheese. Anything else is just extra or has been put
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there unnaturally. Rennet sometimes it will probably be listed as rennet or it'll be listed
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as enzymes and bacteria would be listed as lactic bacteria, live bacteria, probiotic,
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something like that. Do you think organic, conventional, do you focus on those when someone's buying
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cheese or do you think with the process it doesn't matter? I think it does matter. Cows that are
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raised in the way that you want to buy your milk, for example, are going to give you more nutritious
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cheese, I should say. The grass for cow, it's a whole thing, but milk cows, I don't 100% believe
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that we have bred them to a point where they actually can't sustain their health on grass alone.
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As long as they're healthy grass-fed cows, then I promote grass-fed cheese.
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And then from there, what organic? Organic, you know, anyways that you're kind of looking to
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buy your regular foods anyways are good practices to bring in there. But yeah, I would say the
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big one is local, then making sure it only has those four ingredients, making sure you pick out
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one that your family loves. And for anyone that's sensitive to lactose,
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is age cheese going to have less of it? Is there a truth to that? That the more age the cheese
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or the harder the cheese, the more possibility they won't have issue? Yeah, absolutely. So the
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lactic bacteria that we talked about, they feed on the lactose and they ferment it into lactic acid.
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So if a cheese is an age longer, for example, a parmesan, there's probably very little lactose
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actually in it. So if you are truly lactose intolerant, you can probably consume those
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cheeses. So parmesan is one, what's some others that would be an example? Long-aged cheddar,
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Colby, what other ones? Is there like a specific age with a cheddar like that it should be?
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Do you happen to know that? I don't know exactly, but I would say any cheese that was aged probably
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over like three months. Honestly, by the time that they get to where they're being wrapped and stored,
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there's very little lactose left into those cheese anyways. But if you're truly, truly lactose
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allergy, you shouldn't consume cheese, but because there will be traces of lactose in there.
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If you're just intolerant of it, you know, you could probably even consume
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fresh or aged cheeses. You have been working with cheese for now for 10 years.
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Is there ever been like a kind of concern or fear that what if I become lactose intolerant,
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you know, from just consuming it so much? Because you know, there's a possibility when someone
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does something so much that they can become sensitive to it. Is there that been a fear or is
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that ever come up for you or your family? I don't think it's ever been a fear that I thought
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up about too much. I actually think that a lot of people that presume that they are lactose
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intolerant, this is a game just my opinion, but I think a lot of people that presume that
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they're lactose intolerant might actually be sensitive to the proteins in milk. So there's
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different types of proteins that cows can have in their milk. So I think a lot of times that's maybe
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where that's kind of stemming from. I feel like if you're fermenting milk, it's just way more
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easier to digest. I actually don't drink a lot of just raw milk that is fresh. Most of the dairy
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products that I'm consuming have been fermented. Yeah, I haven't ever worried about it, but I think
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that really helps with digestion. Yeah, in a sense, it's almost like you're saying like if you
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just kind of properly prepare it, use the cleanest and most natural ingredients that, you know, life
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kind of will protect you in a sense. It's like pre-digesting it a little bit for your body so that
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it's more bioavailable for you and that you can actually take those nutrients and use them.
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So let's just say now, someone's like, okay, I really, I want to make my first
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fermented or cheese dairy product. Where should they start? Should they start with yogurt?
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And what's your thought on that? Yeah, I think yogurt is a great starting point.
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Caffeer is also a really great starting point. If you have access to fresh raw milk, that
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clapper that I talked about is also like probably my number one starting point. If you have a
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dairy animal, you have to be keeping a clapper culture because it's such an amazing product.
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You know, we eat a lot of clapper in our house. So probably if you don't have a dairy animal
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or anything though, if you can get access to some kefir grains, they're going to be a really
26:06
easy dairy product for you to kind of keep just like a sourdough starter feeding every day,
26:11
getting this product every day that you're able to consume. And if you can't get your hands on
26:15
any kefir grains, that yogurt is also a really great starting point.
26:19
Can we actually give people a basic recipe for you choose either yogurt or clapper?
26:26
I'll give a recipe for yogurt because it's probably just kind of the one that is most
26:32
available to most people. But basically what you're doing when you make yogurt is your pasteurizing
26:38
the milk, which seems funny, but don't worry. We're going to add bacteria back into it. So you
26:42
heat it up to a high temperature. So usually about 190 degrees Fahrenheit. And this pasteurizes out
26:48
any of the raw milk bacteria or if it's already pasteurized milk, it pasteurizes out any other
26:53
bacteria that have been but are mentally been introduced. And it also changes the composition
26:59
of the milk so that you're going to get a creamier texture. So it's also important for
27:04
that creamy texture of yogurt to heat up to that high temperature. And then what you're going
27:08
to do is you're going to lower the temperature back down to a good fermenting temperature.
27:12
So usually this is about 110 degrees for yogurt culture because it's like I said before that
27:18
thermophilic warm loving bacteria. So you're going to cool it down to 110. Then you're going to
27:24
add it in your starter culture. And so if you don't have any yogurt culture, you can just use yogurt
27:29
from the grocery store. Just make sure that it has live bacteria, isn't it? So it hasn't been
27:33
pasteurized after the making of it because it's crazy. Sometimes yogurt is made commercially.
27:39
And then they pasteurize the yogurt without basically killing all the good stuff. So just
27:43
plain yogurt from the grocery store that still has live bacteria, isn't it? You can add that in.
27:48
You're going to add a quarter cup of yogurt in per gallon of milk used. And then you're going to
27:54
just stir it up and let it sit in a warm place for about eight hours. And then it should be nice.
28:00
Beautifully thick yogurt. You're only putting in the refrigerator when it's kind of at the
28:06
flavor or the culture that you want it to be right. So in many ways, I know like for example eggs
28:12
don't always have to be kept in. Particularly if you're getting them from from a fresh farm,
28:17
they don't have to be kept in the refrigerator. Is that true with some cheeses as well?
28:22
To a point, cheese making is the decomposition of milk. So it's like fancy composting. So
28:28
cheeses that you're making would be safe to consume even though you left them at room temperature.
28:34
But they're going to continue to evolve. They're going to continue to ferment. And because they're
28:37
at a warmer temperature, that might not be a desirable ferment. It might not taste good. So cooler
28:42
temperatures are good for cheeses to be stored in. Just not as cool as your regular refrigerator. So
28:48
like fresh dairy products like yogurt and stuff, they can be stored in your regular refrigerator.
28:52
In fact, I recommend it. But for like actual cheeses, usually they're stored between about 50
28:58
and 60 degrees Fahrenheit. So a lot of people store them in like their sellers or their addicts.
29:03
I have a special refrigerator that I have a thermostat hooked up to that. I just keep it at that
29:08
temperature. Oh, similar to how people, you know, keep wine or something like that. Yeah, exactly.
29:13
Wine fridges like lots of people use wine fridges as cheese. Cheese caves. You've taught a lot of
29:20
people how to make cheese. Do you find that there is a specific mindset that helps for
29:28
them to enjoy making cheese? I think just not over complicating it. I think that it's very easy
29:34
to go into it. And one, you don't know anything. And then there's all these new things that you're
29:39
learning. And so you're as you learn, it's really easy to become overwhelmed. So what I recommend,
29:44
people do is don't research too much before you dive in. Just order your ingredients basically
29:49
pick one recipe, make that recipe and then make it over and over and over again until it feels
29:54
comfortable before you start branching out and trying to do too many different things.
29:59
I think that is sort of the best mindset to get in because it is so easy to overwhelm yourself.
30:04
And cheese making isn't just the, especially age cheese making is not just the making part. It's
30:10
also the aging part. And so sure you learn how to make the cheese, but then now you have to learn
30:15
how to age it. And so it just helps so much if you just do one cheese and get really, really good
30:21
at making it and then add in more cheeses after that. What do you think the learning curve is?
30:27
Like if someone's brand new to it, are we talking a month? Are we talking six months to actually
30:33
start to feel like you, not a master, but like that, okay, I got this. Depends what type of cheese
30:39
you're trying to make. I recommend that you just start with simple daring processing. Start with
30:44
making like yogurt and you can become a master of yogurt in like two, three batches. You might even
30:49
feel like you're a master of making yogurt after the first batch because it really is just that easy.
30:54
And so that's going to just give you some confidence to sort of go from there. And then if you just
30:59
sort of pick one cheese, plug away at it, get good at it, you're going to kind of become a master
31:04
of each cheese as you go along. And that's going to propel your learning a lot quicker than trying
31:09
to bounce around all sorts of different cheeses. What's a good first cheese for some to start?
31:13
We mentioned yogurt for that yogurt or kefir, but what's a good first cheese?
31:18
Make some yogurt, then make some cream cheese, and then maybe like some fresh cottage cheese or
31:24
something like that, a really good sort of age cheese to start with as feta, especially because
31:29
you don't really need a lot of fancy equipment. You probably have everything in your kitchen that
31:33
you already need to make feta. You just have to order a few of the ingredients. So that's a first
31:38
good age cheese to make would be feta. You obviously focus on cow, but how does species affect
31:44
the cheese? I'm sure you've worked with goat as well, right? I haven't done much of it, but I
31:49
teach a lot of goat milk cheese makers and also sheep milk cheese makers. I wish I had a sheep.
31:54
Sheeps milk is like, it's amazing. It makes such good cheese. All ruminant species of animals
32:02
can their milk can be turned into cheese. And you can make all of the same cheeses that I make with
32:06
cow's milk with goat's milk or with sheep's milk. It's going to be basically the same process.
32:12
The taste is going to be a little bit different. You can't take the goat out of the goat milk and
32:16
you can't take the sheep out of the sheep's milk, but those kind of nuances, they're fine. They just,
32:21
I would say, add to the cheese. Have you ever worked with camel? I've never worked with camel, but
32:27
that would be cool. I think if I had like to have a wish list for species, it would be like camel,
32:32
yak, donkey. I want to try and making cheese with all those. It's funny. I asked about the camel,
32:38
though, because I was I was in some Amos country in Pennsylvania and I learned that they they're
32:44
at least in that area near gap Pennsylvania. They have a camel farm and and it was really interesting.
32:50
I was talking to a functional doctor who was dealing with a patient whose child was having lots
32:57
of issues and he recommended that they try camel milk and they did and the child's issues
33:05
completely went away. So I was like, wow, so there's some power in camel milk. What's that all about?
33:10
But I didn't get much further than that, but it sounds like it's new to you as well.
33:14
The only observation I had of someone using camel milk was there's this guy his account is
33:20
the milk tracker on Instagram. He goes all over the world looking for a traditional cheese making
33:24
and so he was they were moving camels from some place and yeah, had all this camel milk and
33:30
stuff and they had these little outer covers to cut so that they could calf share with the camels.
33:34
It was pretty cool. Now, what role do you think cheese making plays in building resilience
33:41
in our homesteading communities are just in general when you are supporting people and learning
33:46
at what what do you find particularly in today's world where you know, resilience is maybe potentially
33:52
a lost art, but it's also so important for us to be moving more towards because we need more of
33:58
it, right? It's so important that we learn at least a little bit of the skill cheese making on
34:04
our homesteads or in our communities because we don't want to become a lost art. We want to
34:10
preserve all of these traditions that are lost already and so we don't want to lose the ones
34:15
that we're finding. So that's really important and it's also really important to know how to preserve
34:21
your milk. Like, milk was never meant to be refrigerated. Refrigeration has brand new
34:26
in cheese making if you're looking at in terms of the thousands of years that cheese has been made.
34:31
So we don't want to lose the skill of being able to preserve our milk and save it for seasons when
34:37
we don't have milk because there is seasonality to milk and to cheese making that we just don't
34:43
recognize these days because you can always go to the grocery store and you can always get milk
34:47
and so that's important to kind of recognize as well. Cheese making, as you mentioned, is a lost art,
34:53
I mean, in many ways. And so there's a real effort and clearly you're leading, you know,
34:59
when the leaders of this effort to support people in maintaining traditional cheese making skills
35:05
to help spread the knowledge of that, if we were to see cheese making disappear as a skill,
35:14
but you had to preserve, you know, one part of that process for future generations. What do you think
35:22
that would be and why? I think that we would never see cheese making completely disappear because
35:28
milk wants to be turned to cheese. If you milk out of a cow and you let it sit out, it's going to
35:34
collaborate. It's going to turn into cheese. And so I think kind of that knowledge that if we lean
35:39
into natural cheese making, we lean into the natural properties of milk. That would be what I
35:44
would want to preserve, you know, the idea that, okay, we've lost everything, but if we lean into
35:51
what milk actually wants to do, we could learn what we need to know. It would re-teach us if we
35:56
really leaned into the natural properties of milk. I love that thought that it's almost like the milk,
36:04
it has a desired outcome and we just have to listen to it, you know, we just have to be patient and
36:11
listen to it and let it do its thing. That's really cool. Obviously, you provide educational
36:17
programs. Anyone that's interested in learning more, particularly if you want to dive into the
36:22
clapper, where would they find you and where should they start? I have a website, so cheesefromscratch.com,
36:29
jump on my newsletter list. So I send out a newsletter every Monday. I've got a book coming out
36:34
in spring 2025. It's being published through Homestead Living, so I'm very excited about that. So
36:39
if you're on my newsletter list, you'll, you'll find out about that first. And then for like the
36:43
kind of day-to-day things, I'm on Instagram, I'm on YouTube. So you can find all sorts of kind of
36:50
inspiration and tutorials and stuff on both of those channels. In your handle, and we'll put that
36:56
in the show notes, but if you just want to verbally say it. At and then cheese underscore from
37:01
underscore scratch underscore. What's the milkmaid society? So that's my monthly membership club.
37:07
It teaches all things cheese making and dairy processing and milkhouse and dairy goats
37:12
information created by me, but also I've hired, I think I've got like 30 people have contributed
37:19
content to the milkmaid society. So it was kind of like the goal of it was to become like this
37:24
ultimate resource for people, milkmaids or milkmen who wanted to have everything in one spot.
37:31
It's been going for two and a half years now, and there's a ton of information on there.
37:35
That's a good point though. Do you find that cheese making skews more female or male?
37:40
I don't think so anymore, but I think that it maybe used to be sort of more of a male in the
37:46
last 100 years. It was sort of more of a male dominated area, but I think as more people are
37:51
learning how to make cheese on their homesteads, it's kind of it's for everyone.
37:55
Well, thank you again, and we'll put all the links in the show notes. I hope that this episode
38:01
has inspired people to start making whether it's yogurt or kaffir making something from scratch,
38:09
because I really do believe that controlling our ingredients is the way to go. And you know,
38:15
what you find in the store, whether it's ultra processed, ultra pasteurized, has more than four
38:20
ingredients. There's lots of things you just have to be aware of, and I love that you're really
38:25
teaching people to kind of take that power back. I'm looking forward to hopefully converting lots
38:31
of people to starting to make their own cheese. Before we go though, where would people like,
38:38
let's just say if they do want to make kefir, are you teaching them how to make it themselves
38:44
without outside source, or where do you usually recommend people purchase the freeze-dried cultures
38:51
if they are using anything? So in the United States, the best one probably is cheesemaking.com,
38:56
it's a new England cheese making company. And if you're in Canada, probably the best one would
39:02
be Glen Gary cheese making out of Ontario. You can also order from there if you're in the States,
39:06
too. So those are good places to sort of start and get your ingredients. As far as kefir,
39:12
it's nice if you can find somebody in your area that is already making it. And so kefir is very
39:17
cool. The grains are all probably derived from one grain that was made thousands and thousands
39:24
of years ago. So if you can find somebody in your area that has kefir grains kind of going,
39:29
then you can take some of their kefir grains and start your own. How should someone try to
39:34
source raw milk if they are interested in going that direction? So it definitely depends where you
39:39
are located. If you're in the States, there is a cool map. It's on a website called realmilk.com,
39:46
so you can go into that map and it kind of links you with people that are selling raw milk.
39:51
If you're in Canada, we don't have that map and it is quite illegal to buy raw milk, but you know,
39:56
just ask around. There's Facebook pages for almost every province to help farmers sort of
40:01
discreetly link with consumers, ask around in your communities, ask around at your farmers'
40:06
markets. And a lot of parts of North America, raw milk is illegal, so you do have to be discreet
40:12
about it. But you probably will be able to find it if you dig hard enough. Well, thank you again,
40:18
and thank you all for listening or watching this episode of Everyday Ancestral. Make sure to follow us,
40:25
make sure to subscribe, make sure to share. This is the way we get the word out and please
40:29
stay curious. Thank you, good and relevant.
40:59
Live well and keep it ancestral.