Dry Jack cheese is considered a grating cheese with similar qualities to Parmesan. It is ivory to pale yellow, nutty and complex piquant flavour. It was first made in 1915 in San Francisco, USA.
What I love about this cheese is that you do not need a special press to make it. All I did was form the curds into a ball shape after draining in butter muslin and tie a knot with twine close to the curds. Then fan the excess cloth out and place a chopping board on top with at least 4 litres of water to press. I used a large 5-litre saucepan filled with water on the top board. It was quite stable and didn’t topple, providing me with an initial pressing of 4 kg / 9 lbs.
After two hours, I swapped to a larger pot and filled it with 16 litres of water to give me about 16 kg / 35 lbs of weight. Because the cheese was fairly flat after the initial press, this large pot did not wobble and was stable overnight.
The rub was a tad messy, but I channelled my inner pre-schooler and had a blast! I have now applied the rub three times and it has kept the mould at bay. It is now ripening in the cheese fridge at 13°C / 55°F @ 85% relative humidity. I hope to age it for about 3 months as it is a lot smaller than the traditional Dry Jack.
I’ve created a Dry Jack Cheese recipe card for you to purchase at Little Green Workshops.
