Cheddar-style cheese
A pressed cheese whose curd is cooked slowly, then cheddared: kept warm in slabs that are turned and stacked for hours before milling, salting and pressing.
Built structures · Kettles, coppers and boilers
Supported pot inside a water bath
double boiler · water-jacketed vat
A food pot held at a fixed height inside a larger vessel of controlled hot water: the water distributes heat while the milk or whey inside stays still and away from the heater.
Overview
A cheese vat needs two things that pull against each other: even heating and an undisturbed rennet set. A supported pot in a water bath gives both. The bath water can move, by a pump or by convection, while the milk stays still and away from the heater.
Hamblyn's brewery is the documented example, with a rim-hung pot. The same idea appears with slow cookers and sous-vide baths in other articles.
How it works
Heat flows from water to food in proportion to the temperature difference. The food approaches the bath temperature ever more slowly, and a large bath cannot shed heat quickly if it overshoots. The bath therefore buffers heating, but it does not hold the food below the bath temperature: set the bath too hot and the food follows.
A brewer's controller reads the bath, not the food. Moving water helps. The BC Centre for Disease Control's sous-vide guideline warns that baths without adequate circulation have cold and warm spots and come up to temperature more slowly.
Documented uses
Halloumi and hellim: the set and curd cook are done in the bath. Whey cooking near boiling is untested.
Cheddar: ripening, set, slow cook and warm cheddaring in the bath.
Anari: the whey is reheated in the bath after the primary cheese is made.
Measuring
Log the bath display and a probe in the food's centre during a water-only trial, then during the first real batch.
Sources for this section
Limits
The rack variant and any use in a commercial all-in-one brewer are proposed, not documented.
To hold food at 88 to 91 °C for halloumi whey, the bath must sit near boiling. The time to get there is unknown (reasoned).
Displacement and evaporation reduce the water over a brewer's element.
History
Hamblyn's brewery double boiler is documented in a 2017 interview. The rack variant is proposed. The water-bath principle appears in other cheesemaking recipes and in a sous-vide food-safety guideline.
Site
SettingA cheese or dairy workspace: an outer vessel of controlled hot water, with a food pot held at a fixed height inside it.
ClimateBath water at the controller's setting. The bath buffers heating but does not hold the food below the bath temperature.
NotesThe sources give no dimensions for the outer vessel or the inner pot, other than the Hamblyn brewery's 50 L pot in a 70 L mash tun.
A build is made where it stands: moving it means building it again.
How it is built
Risks and precautions · Standard risk
Uneven bath temperature without circulation
Devices without adequate water circulation have cold and warm spots and slower come-up times, per the sous-vide guideline.
Hazard sourceKeep the bath water moving by a pump or convection, and check the food temperature with a probe in the centre.
Control sourceKeep the pump return out of the food. The bath buffers heat but does not cap the food's temperature.
Materials
- 1 Outer vessel — Filled with water, with a heater and controller.
- 1 Inner pot — Hung by its rim or handles (documented, Hamblyn), or held by a load-bearing rack or bridge (proposed). Its rim sits above the water line.
- Pump return — Discharges into the gap around the pot, never into the food.
- Lid — May cover the bath, but nothing seals the food.
- 1 Probe — In the centre of the food.
- Fill the outer vessel with water, and fit the heater and controller.
- Hang the inner pot by its rim or handles, or hold it on a load-bearing rack or bridge.
- Check that water surrounds the pot's sides and base, and that the rim sits above the water line.
- Route any pump return into the gap, never into the food.
- Put a probe in the centre of the food. Log the bath display and the food temperature in a water-only trial, then in the first real batch.
Places
New Zealand
Documented use · Country evidenceTony Hamblyn's brewery double boiler: a 50 L pot hung in a 70 L mash tun with circulated hot water.
Related
Used for
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Sources
New England Cheesemaking Supply Company (cheesemaking.com)Documented use
Tony Hamblyn Cheesemaker in New ZealandCited in: Overview; Measuring; Limits
BC Centre for Disease Control Environmental Health Services and the BC Sous Vide Working GroupMethod
Guidelines for restaurant sous vide cooking safety in British Columbia (cover dated July 2017; citation January 2016)Cited in: Overview; How it works
New England Cheesemaking Supply CompanyMethod
Cheddar Cheese Making Recipe (Jim Wallace)Cited in: Documented uses
New England Cheesemaking Supply CompanyMethod
Halloumi Cheese Making Recipe Instructions (Jim Wallace)Cited in: Documented uses; Limits
New England Cheesemaking Supply CompanyMethod
Ricotta Cheese Making Recipe (Jim Wallace)Cited in: Documented uses