Episode 008: Dutch-Style Cheese Press

Sometimes when I travel, particularly in Europe, I encounter some truly delicious cheeses.  Unfortunately, most of these just aren’t available in my local grocery stores.  If you do have consistent access to local, artisan cheeses, realize that you are one of the fortunate few.  For most of us, getting many of these cheeses can become very cost or time-prohibitive.  I have a particular love of cheese, which I’m sure many of you share, and this causes my dilemma. 

As masters of none, how are we going to fix this problem?  We’re going to learn how to make our own cheese.  The good news is that with a few fairly simple tools and readily-available ingredients, we can make almost any variety of cheese at home. 

The one critical piece of equipment that’s missing from most of our kitchens is a cheese press.  I’ve pressed home-made cheese by hand before with fair results, but using a real cheese press is a game-changer.  In this episode, we reverse-engineer, design, and build a traditional Dutch-style cheese press.  Of course, we also need to talk about cheese itself, so we end up having some good science, history, and cultural discussions.

In future episodes, we’ll put the cheese press to work and actually make some delicious cheeses at home.  For now though, you can start getting ready by building your own cheese press.  You can also buy a cheese press if that’s the route you want to go, but building your own will save about 80% of the cost, and of course will also give you the satisfaction of making something with your own hands.