This weekend, the old lagering tunnels of Crown Finish Caves, in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, play host to a fascinating series of cheesemaking events. David Asher, author of “The Art of Natural Cheesemaking”, will be leading a series of cheesemaking classes, focused on his unique methods of “lab-free” dairy production, from simple farmer’s cheeses and yogurts, to bloomy rinds in the style of Camembert, hard-aged Tommes and other advanced cheeses.
Asher is an organic farmer, cheesemaker and educator, based on Saltspring Island, British Columbia, where he runs the Black Sheep School of Cheesemaking. As he describes his approach on his site, he is “A guerrilla cheesemaker [who] does not make cheese according to standard industrial practices - he explores traditionally cultured, non-corporate methods of cheesemaking.”
The recipes eschew the use of the standard foil envelope-packaged, lab standardized starters, ripening cultures and adjuncts (if you’ve ever made cheese at home you’ve probably encountered these; here at Cheese Notes we’ll confess to using them on a regular basis); rather, with the use of Kefirs and other naturally produced produced mother cultures, he generates impressive results, producing cheeses that look, taste and smell like the real thing.
Which they are, of course; the history of cheesemaking, over the last thousands of years, has largely been one of cheesemakers fabricating cheese as Asher does, working with mother cultures, innoculating from one batch to the next, carefully stewarding the precious cultures over weeks, months and years, because there were no Chr. Hansen’s or Danisco’s to order from if you let them die. It’s only in the 20th century that widespread production of cultures in labs became standard practice, and the majority of cheesemakers came to rely on these prefabricated cultures in their daily work. The recipes are designed for the home and small-scale cheesemaker, but could certainly be scaled up to commercial production. And indeed, there are many commercial cheesemakrs who do utilize these methods, in whole or in part; for example, Peter Dixon, Vermont’s cheese whisperer and the maker behind Parish Hill Creamery, utilizes mother cultures which draw on the native microbiota of his Vermont terroir, and there are many others.
On Friday I attended the reception for the weekend, hosted by Crown Finish Caves and Slow Food USA. After mixing and mingling for a little while with fellow Brooklyn curd-lovers, Asher gave a talk in which he explained the fundamentals of his approach. The use of Kefir is central to Asher’s method; this unusual microbial gem is thousands of years old, a gelatinous lump of microbes that is teeming with a dizzying variety of organisms, which can turn milk into a delicious, efervescent beverage (Kefir), but can also be used as the starter culture for a wide variety of cheese styles. The organisms necessary are present; it’s just a matter of teasing them into action by exposing them to the proper conditions. Asher even manages to activate complex geotrichum and penicilium rind cultures, which you might not expect to be present in Kefir, thus producing bloomy rind, Camembert, Crottin and more.
He also showed us how, through the use of a simple slice of sourdough bread rubbed with a bit of blue cheese mold, he is able to grow his own blue cheese culture, which he can then innoculate into his milk for the cheesemaking.
After his talk, Crown finish laid out a sampling of their cheeses, including the Paymaster, which won a ribbon at this year’s American Cheese Society competition, the Capacious Buck, Suffolk Punch, West West Blue, and more. A delicious spread was provided by Crown Finish’s neighbors at 925 Bergen, The Pixie and the Scout (the brisket and their housemade kraut were the highlights for me).
The events for this weekend are sold out, but if you’re interested in learning more I highly recommend purchasing “The Art of Natural Cheesemaking”. And if you find yourself on the west coast of Canada, check out his classes at the Black Sheep School.
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