Ledger / Semi-hard / 2026-10-21
Caerphilly: Three Weeks From Vat to Table
Caerphilly is the fastest-ripening pressed cheese in this ledger. A low scald, a hard press, a dry-salted rind and a 13 C cave get it to a crumbly, lemony, genuinely good cheese in twenty-one days. It is the right first make for anyone who has only ever done fresh cheese.
Each segment is as wide as its share of the 85 minutes in the vat; the set segment carries the set temperature, the cut segment carries the cut size.
Salt and press drawer
Press ladder
- 5 kg0.5 h
- 10 kg1.5 h
- 16 kg6 h
Fine salt rubbed into the surface at 8-12 g per kg, repeated until the salt stops disappearing.
Thirty-minute set, 34 C scald, no wash
0.6% mesophilic culture at 32 C, thirty minutes of ripening, 28 IMCU of animal rennet per litre, thirty-minute set. Cut to 10 mm and raise to 34 C over twenty minutes only.
No curd washing. Caerphilly gets its lemony edge from a normal acid development, and washing the curd to sweeten it would leave you with a cheese that tastes of nothing and ripens too slowly.
Press hard and dry-salt the rind
Press at 5 kg for thirty minutes, 10 kg for ninety minutes and 16 kg for six hours. Turn at each change and keep the follower centred.
Then dry-salt: rub 2% fine salt over the whole wheel and leave it at 14 C, turning twice a day and rubbing in whatever salt has drawn out. Do this for three days. Dry salting gives Caerphilly its distinctive dry, floury rind, and it also firms the outside enough to hold a wheel that was only lightly scalded.
Thirteen degrees and high humidity
Age at 13 C and 88% RH. That is warm and damp for a pressed cheese, and it is deliberate: Caerphilly is meant to ripen fast, and the same wheel aged at 10 C and 80% takes seven weeks to reach the same place.
Turn daily for the first ten days. A faint white surface mould is expected and is brushed off with a dry brush; a blue-green one means the humidity has gone too high, so drop it to 82% for three days.
Eat at three weeks, and know when to stop
At twenty-one days the cheese is crumbly, moist and sharply lemony with a clean acid finish. This is the classic point. At five weeks it is firmer and the lemon has turned to a general sharpness.
Caerphilly does not improve indefinitely. Past eight weeks it dries out from the rind inward and the texture becomes chalky rather than crumbly. Make it in small wheels and eat them on a schedule rather than keeping one for a year.
Aging parameters
| Milk | Pasteurised cow milk 3.5% fat |
|---|---|
| Culture | Mesophilic 20–30 °C |
| Rennet | Calf rennet (animal) 28 IMCU/L |
| pH at drain | 6.1 target 6.1–6.5 |
| Target moisture | 45 % |
| Cave temperature | 13 °C |
| Cave humidity | 88 % |
| Aging days | 21 days |
| Rind treatment | Dry salt rub |
| Yield | 3.3 kg |
Pasteurised cow milk Semi-hard 21 days
Defect diagnosis
Flagged on this make: Bitterness、Misread surface mould
Bitterness seen this make
Signal — A harsh, lingering bitter note at the back of the palate, strongest in the first three weeks and often fading after six.
Cause — Too much rennet for the set time, or a microbial coagulant with high protease activity, or a scald that never got past 38 C.
Fix — Cut the dose by 20% next make and hold the scald 2 C higher for 10 minutes longer. Bitter peptides are water-soluble, so a 12% brine for 24 hours pulls some out.
Rancidity not seen
Signal — Soapy, paint-like smell that hits before the cheese reaches the mouth. Sharp and unpleasant rather than merely strong.
Cause — Free fatty acids released by lipase, usually from raw milk that sat warm too long, or from rennet paste, or from a knife or cloth that carried old milk residue.
Fix — Chill milk to 4 C within two hours of milking and pasteurise anything older than 24 hours. Retire the cloth: boil it, do not just rinse it.
Faulty eye formation not seen
Signal — Either no eyes where the style demands them, or a scatter of irregular slits and cracks instead of round, evenly spaced holes.
Cause — Coliform or yeast contamination from unsanitary brine, or a press that was too cold (below 18 C) so the propionic culture never woke up, or too much salt killing it outright.
Fix — Boil and re-salt the brine to 18-20% between batches, press at 20-22 C for the first six hours, and keep the salt under 1.6% for eye-forming styles.
Misread surface mould seen this make
Signal — A grey-green or black fuzzy patch on a rind that was supposed to be white or orange, or blue speckling on a hard cheese.
Cause — Wild Penicillium and Cladosporium from a cave with moving air and standing humidity. Also from brushing a good rind with a damp, dirty brush.
Fix — Distinguish before you discard: white felt and orange smear are wanted, green fuzz on a hard rind is surface only and rubs off with 3% brine. Black patches that pit the paste mean the wheel is lost.
Four things to carry forward
- 0.6% mesophilic, 28 IMCU/litre, no curd washing
- Scald only to 34 C, then press 16 kg for six hours
- Dry-salt the rind at 2% over three days
- Age at 13 C / 88% RH and eat at 21 days