Culture advice

[Kudos1uk]

Hi all,
I am new to cheese making and have made my first already, its a Parmesan and I am very happy with the result, will be a long wait until I can try it but right now I am very hopeful.

My question is, having bought a Thermophilic Type B Culture for Italian cheese, can I be frugal and use the same culture for making Cheddar? I am never going to use up all this type b and it would be great if it would work (obviously with the extra ingredients and steps required for cheddar).

As I am so chuffed with my first effort on Parmesan, I hope you don't mind me sharing my results
My baby is only a week old and I am very proud of it

 

[bernardsmith]

Hi Kudos1uk, and welcome. You asked what is for me, a fascinating question. I am really interested in what others in this community have to say. Just to clarify: You have a relatively "higher temperature" (thermophilic) culture and you want to know if you can use this to make mesophilic (lower temperature) cheeses. Here's the thing: I use only kefir I make from kefir grains for both thermo- and meso-philic cultures but then kefir has both cultures as part of the matrix. So when I use the kefir to culture a cheese whose curds I cook at higher temperatures the heat will kill or cripple the lower temp bacteria. When I use the kefir to culture the milk that I cook at lower temps the higher temp cultures do not multiply at a suitable rate and the mesophilic bacteria dominate.
My suspicion then is that you may need to allow the culture longer to reproduce if the temperature that you cook the curds is going to be lower.. But I honestly do not know although I would love to hear what others have to say.

 

[Kudos1uk]

Hi Kudos1uk, and welcome. You asked what is for me, a fascinating question. I am really interested in what others in this community have to say. Just to clarify: You have a relatively "higher temperature" (thermophilic) culture and you want to know if you can use this to make mesophilic (lower temperature) cheeses. Here's the thing: I use only kefir I make from kefir grains for both thermo- and meso-philic cultures but then kefir has both cultures as part of the matrix. So when I use the kefir to culture a cheese whose curds I cook at higher temperatures the heat will kill or cripple the lower temp bacteria. When I use the kefir to culture the milk that I cook at lower temps the higher temp cultures do not multiply at a suitable rate and the mesophilic bacteria dominate.
My suspicion then is that you may need to allow the culture longer to reproduce if the temperature that you cook the curds is going to be lower.. But I honestly do not know although I would love to hear what others have to say.

Thank you for the message, today I decided to run my thoughts by "Goat Nutrition" who I buy my ingredients from in the UK, they told me the thermophilic culture would not work at the lower temperatures, which is pretty much what you were saying in your reply. It's funny, I had not even thought about the temperatures being a newbie, I was thinking more about flavours it might impart it makes complete sense now I think about it.

They recommended I use Meso Type II, so I have gone ahead and ordered that and a couple of other things (Annatto & Calcium chloride) I need for the cheddar cheese.

I guess I can't be quite so frugal this time.

Many thanks for helping.

 

[Gadjobrinus]

Kefir is a very rich amalgam of mesophilic strains - several yeasts, LB, LC, acetobacters, strep, etc. This is not to say there's a perfect cutoff past which you get a cleaving/killing of the species, but they are mesophilic.

Your thermo B is essentially a (Bulgarian) yogurt culture - your thermophilic (Strep. thermophilus) and mesophilic lactobacillus bulgaricus. Thermo C uses Lacto helveticus. Both are closely related. In both, your meso bacterias are more proteolytic than if you went with ST only, so there's your flavor benefits among other things. I made french alpines and simply cultured mine up from yogurt annually.

You would not be very happy, I don't think, using Thermo B on cheddar. Your mesos in cheddar are lactococci, not lactobacilli; and while some cheddar blends will use some thermophilic bacteria (strep) in their blend, this is not for any thermophilic process; it is used for its metabolic benefits as the cheese cools and matures.

I'd suggest just trying a simple MA culture for your cheddar, and go from there.

Edit: crossed in the mail. Your Type II will work just fine. It is a single species, Lactococcus spp. cremoris. Danisco MA 11 has Lc. lactis as well as the cremoris. Danisco's RA series, RA 21 or 22, might also be interesting. It has the addition of the streptococcus (thermophilic) I mention above.

 

[bernardsmith]

I am simply going by David Asher's cheese-making processes as published in The Art of Natural Cheesemaking (Chelsea Green , 2015) where he uses only kefir as his culture for just about every cheese he makes and sells from meso to thermophilic (sadly no Penicillin R. in kefir otherwise I could make blue cheese with the cultures from the grains).

 

[Kudos1uk]

Kefir is a very rich amalgam of mesophilic strains - several yeasts, LB, LC, acetobacters, strep, etc. This is not to say there's a perfect cutoff past which you get a cleaving/killing of the species, but they are mesophilic.

Your thermo B is essentially a (Bulgarian) yogurt culture - your thermophilic (Strep. thermophilus) and mesophilic lactobacillus bulgaricus. Thermo C uses Lacto helveticus. Both are closely related. In both, your meso bacterias are more proteolytic than if you went with ST only, so there's your flavor benefits among other things. I made french alpines and simply cultured mine up from yogurt annually.

You would not be very happy, I don't think, using Thermo B on cheddar. Your mesos in cheddar are lactococci, not lactobacilli; and while some cheddar blends will use some thermophilic bacteria (strep) in their blend, this is not for any thermophilic process; it is used for its metabolic benefits as the cheese cools and matures.

I'd suggest just trying a simple MA culture for your cheddar, and go from there.

Edit: crossed in the mail. Your Type II will work just fine. It is a single species, Lactococcus spp. cremoris. Danisco MA 11 has Lc. lactis as well as the cremoris. Danisco's RA series, RA 21 or 22, might also be interesting. It has the addition of the streptococcus (thermophilic) I mention above.

Wow, thank you that is very informative, you certainly know your cultures

 

[Gadjobrinus]

I am simply going by David Asher's cheese-making processes as published in The Art of Natural Cheesemaking (Chelsea Green , 2015) where he uses only kefir as his culture for just about every cheese he makes and sells from meso to thermophilic (sadly no Penicillin R. in kefir otherwise I could make blue cheese with the cultures from the grains).

Well, it was just my understanding that it's a very rich meso culture.

Just a quick wiki:

Kefir

or kephir (/kəˈfɪər/ kə-FEER),[1][2] is a fermented milk drink similar to a thin yogurt that is made from kefir grains, a specific type of mesophilic symbiotic culture. The drink originated in the North Caucasus, Eastern Europe and Russia,[3] where it is prepared by inoculating cow, goat, or sheep milk with kefir grains.[4]

Kefir - Wikipedia

Probiotic

bacteria found in kefir products include: Lactobacillus acidophilus, Bifidobacterium bifidum, Streptococcus thermophilus, Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. bulgaricus, Lactobacillus helveticus, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Lactococcus lactis, and Leuconostoc species.[14][23][27] Lactobacilli in kefir may exist in concentrations varying from approximately 1 million to 1 billion colony-forming units per milliliter, and are the bacteria responsible for the synthesis of the polysaccharide kefiran.[4]

In addition to bacteria, kefir often contains strains of yeast that can metabolize lactose, such as Kluyveromyces marxianus, Kluyveromyces lactis, and Saccharomyces fragilis, as well as strains of yeast that do not metabolize lactose, including Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Torulaspora delbrueckii, and Kazachstania unispora.[14] The nutritional significance of these strains is unknown.

I imagine this isn't universal as you'll often find all kinds of stuff in autochthonous (fancy way of saying indigenous - I prefer the former, as it implies local microbial species much more, to me) cultures. I wouldn't be suprised to find some S. thermophilus; just that overwhelmingly it's a meso blend.

Edit: speak of the devil.

Kefir grains have a complex composition of microbial species such as the predominance of lactic acid bacteria, acetic bacteria, yeasts, and fungi (Jianzhong et al., 2009; Pogačić et al., 2013). This microbial species are classified into four groups: homofermentative and heterofermentative lactic acid bacteria and lactose and non-lactose assimilating yeast (Cheirsilp and Radchabut, 2011). In that way, Lactobacillus paracasei ssp. paracasei, Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus delbrueckii ssp. bulgaricus, Lactobacillus plantarum, and L. kefiranofaciens are predominant species. However, these species represent only 20% of the Lactobacillus in the final fermented beverage, with the remainder consisting of Lactobacillus kefiri (80%; Yüksekdag et al., 2004; Zanirati et al., 2015). Acetobacter aceti and A. rasens have also been isolated, such as the fungus Geotrichum candidum. More than 23 different yeast species have been isolated from kefir grains and from fermented beverages of different origins. However, the predominant species are Saccharomyces cerevisiae, S. unisporus, Candida kefyr, and Kluyveromyces marxianus ssp. marxianus (Witthuhn et al., 2004; Diosma et al., 2014; Zanirati et al., 2015; Table Table11).

My eyes are going cross-eyed, so I might have missed one or two instances of S. thermophilus, but outside Turkey and Bulgaria, it's an incredible soup of wild yeasts and mesophilic bacterias.

I was crazy enough to want to isolate and study the characteristics of the many species found on washed hard-rinded cheeses, such as Beaufort. Then, pull together a custom blend based on my best sensory guess for the wash or morge. I don't recommend it. Your wife will hate you.

Kefir species:

Lactobacillus kefir, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Lactobacillus paracasei, Lactobacillus plantarum, Lactococcus lactis ssp. lactis, Kluyveromyces marxianus, Lactobacillus parakefir, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Saccharomyces unisporus, Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Acetobacter sp., Saccharomyces sp., Lactococcus lactis ssp. lactis biovar diacetylactis, Lactococcus lactis, Lactobacillus kefiri, Lactobacillus parakefiri​	Kefir grains and beverage – Argentina​	Garrote et al., 2001; Londero et al., 2012; Hamet et al., 2013; Diosma et al., 2014.​
Lactobacillus kefiri, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Lactococcus lactis, Lactococcus lactis ssp. cremoris, Gluconobacter frateurii, Acetobacter orientalis, Acetobacter lovaniensis, Kluyveromyces marxianus, Naumovozyma sp., Kazachastania khefir​	Kefir grains and beverage – Belgium​	Korsak et al., 2015​
Lactobacillus kefiri, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Lactococcus lactis, Lactobacillus paracasei, Lactobacillus helveticus, Gluconobacter japonicus, Lactobacillus uvarum, Acetobacter syzygii, Lactobacillus satsumensis, Saccharomyces cerevisiae., Leuconostoc sp., Streptococcus sp., Acetobacter sp., Bifidobacterium sp., Halococcus sp., Lactobacillus amylovorus, Lactobacillus buchneri, Lactobacillus crispatus, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens ssp. kefiranofaciens, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens ssp. kefirgranum, Lactobacillus parakefiri​	Kefir grains – Brazil​	Miguel et al., 2010; Leite et al., 2012; Zanirati et al., 2015​
Lactobacillus brevis, Lactobacillus delbrueckii ssp. bulgaricus, Lactobacillus helveticus, Streptococcus thermophilus, Lactobacillus casei ssp. pseudoplantarum, Kluyveromyces marxianus var. lactis, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Candida inconspicua, Candida maris, Lactobacillus lactis ssp. lactis​	Kefir grains and beverage – Bulgaria​	Simova et al., 2002​
Lactobacillus paracasei, Lactobacillus parabuchneri, Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus kefiri, Lactococcus lactis, Acetobacter lovaniensis, Kluyveromyces lactis, Kazachstania aerobia, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Lachancea meyersii​	Kefir beverage – Brazil​	Magalhães et al., 2011​
Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Lactococcus lactis, Lactobacillus helveticus, Kluyveromyces marxianus, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Pseudomonas sp., Kazachstania unispora, Kazachstania exigua, Lactobacillus kefiri, Lactobacillus casei, Bacillus subtilis, Pichia kudriavzevii, Leuconostoc lactis, Lactobacillus plantarum, Acetobacter fabarum, Pichia guilliermondii, Lactococcus sp., Lactobacillus sp., Acetobacter sp., Shewanella sp., Leuconostoc sp., Streptococcus sp, Acinetobacter sp., Pelomonas sp., Dysgonomonas sp., Weissella sp., Shewanella sp.​	Kefir grains (Tibet)– China​	Jianzhong et al., 2009; Gao et al., 2012, 2013a​
Acetobacter acetic, Enterococcus faecalis, Enterococcus durans, Lactococcus lactis ssp. cremoris, Leuconostoc pseudomesenteroides, Leuconostoc paramesenteroides, Lactobacillus brevis, Lactobacillus acidophilus, Saccharomyces sp., Brettanomyces sp., Candida sp., Saccharomycodes sp., Acetobacter rancens​	Kefir beverage – China​	Yang et al., 2007​
Lactobacillaceae and Streptococcaceae​	Kefir grains and beverage – Ireland​	Dobson et al., 2011​
Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Dekkera anomala, Streptococcus thermophilus, Lactococcus lactis, Acetobacter sp., Lactobacillus lactis, Enterococcus sp., Bacillus sp., Acetobacter fabarum, Acetobacter lovaniensis, Acetobacter orientalis​	Kefir grains – Italy​	Garofalo et al., 2015​
Leuconostoc sp., Lactococcus sp., Lactobacillus sp., Lactobacillus plantarum, Zygosaccharomyces sp., Candida sp., Candida lambica, Candida krusei, Saccharomyces sp., Cryptococcus sp.​	Kefir grains and beverage – South Africa​	Witthuhn et al., 2005​
Lactobacillus sp., Leuconostoc sp., Lactococcus sp., Zygosaccharomyces sp., Candida sp., Saccharomyces sp.​	Kefir grains – South Africa​	Witthuhn et al., 2004​
Lactobacillus kefiri, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Lactococcus lactis, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas sp., Saccharomyces turicensis,​	Kefir grains – Taiwan​	Wyder et al., 1999; Chen et al., 2008; Wang et al., 2012;​
Lactobacillus kefiri, Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Lactococcus lactis, Streptococcus thermophilus, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Lactobacillus acidophilus​	Kefir grains and beverage – Turkey​	Guzel-Seydim et al., 2005; Kesmen and Kacmaz, 2011​
Lactobacillus helveticus, Lactobacillus buchneri, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus helveticus, Streptococcus thermophilus, Bifidobacterium bifidum, Kluyveromyces marxianus​	Kefir grains – Turkey​	Kok-Tas et al., 2012; Nalbantoglu et al., 2014​
Lactococcus cremoris, Lactococcus lactis, Streptococcus thermophilus, Streptococcus durans​	Kefir beverage – Turkey​	Yüksekdag et al., 2004​