Time to Restock the Cheese Fridge

[Smoker John]

The cheese is looking good

[tailfeathers]

That's what I ordered (12"). Called mrs tailfeathers last night from the lake to give her a heads up to be watching for it.


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[ragweed]

I assume everyone bought the 12" tube?

Nope.  I had concerns about where I was going to put it for hot smoking so I only got the 6" size.

[pensrock]

Robert, Your cheese looks good. The higher temp and blooming help with the color. Nice job.  :)

[Saber 4]

Robert, Your cheese looks good. The higher temp and blooming help with the color. Nice job.  :)

Thanks Greg, that means a lot coming from you.

I got to use my new AMZEN Tube Smoker this morning to finish the other half of my block of Cooper Sharp to compare it's performance to the Bradley SG for cold smoking cheese. I followed the directions that came with it and seasoned it on the SRG grill after I cooked our dinner last night, then today I filled it a little over 3/4 full, lit it and let it burn for the 10 minutes the instructions call for, then blew out the flames and put it in the drip tray in the Bradley.

It was 43 degrees ambient this morning when I put the Tube in with the cheese, within ten minutes the cabinet temp measured at the vent was up to 106 and climbing so I had to put in some pans of ice, with 2 racks of ice I was able to keep a steady 90 degrees in the cabinet for the rest of the 2 hour smoke. I did get a ton of smoke from the tube smoker, but I only got about 2 hours and 10 minutes on the 3/4 pellet load which seems very short when the instructions say a full 12" tube should cold smoke for about 6 hours.

Here's the cheese out of the smoker



And after a three hour bloom to compare the color with the SG batch



Here it is sealed up for it's month long nap



All in all I don't see a big difference either way on the color at this point, in a month I'll know if there is a taste difference. I'm don't know what I may have done wrong to get such a faster burn time than everyone else seems to be reporting, at this point I can't see 20 lbs. of pellets lasting me a year at the rate I smoke.

[ragweed]

Looks like it will be real tasty in about a month.  Nice color.