Making Cheeses – Susan Ogilvy – Book club Associates (UK) 1976 ISBN 978 0517526356 – It has been around a while but this is a good, basic how-to book for home cheesemaking. Not vast amounts of detail but a good coverage of the basic process, equipment needed, processes for soft and semi-hard cheeses as well as some homemade cheese recipes. There is also a small section at the back covering yogurt, cream and butter making at home. There are no photos but some line drawings, particularly of the equipment.
Making Your Own Cheese & Yogurt – Max Alth – Funk & Wagnalls (???) (US) 1973 ISBN 0 308 10081 6 – This book goes into the history of making dairy products in some details and is written more as a narrative than a straight series of instructions. The author gives details on the different types of milk, using a culture and using rennet, pressing the cheese and equipment required. Yogurt and Keffir are also covered. An interesting book but if you want to cut to the chase and get making probably not the book for you. No photographs but a few line drawings.
Butter and Cheesemaking – V. Cheke and A. Sheppard – Alpha Books (UK & US) 1985 ISBN 0 9066070 14 4 – A reasonable start-out book for home dairy product making including some background on milk and cheesemaking the process in general terms taints in milk and how to test for them, making soft and semi hard cheese, cream, butter, yogurt and junket. No photos but some line drawings.
Cheese and Cheesemaking - Glynn Christian – Macdonald Guidelines (UK) 1977 ISBN 356 06018 7 – This is a verrrry basic book providing information about who makes cheese, history of cheesemaking and types of cheese; then basic instructions on cheesemaking, buying and storing cheese, serving and cooking with it and then provides a guide to some of the European cheeses. The book has some colour photos, black and white photos and line drawings but not a huge amount of information in any one section.
The Art of Home Cheesemaking – Anne Nilsson – Woodbridge Press Publishing company (US) 1979 ISBN 0 912800 56 9 – This book gives a good grounding in the ingredients, tools (including a homemade cheese press ) and takes you through making fresh cheese, hard cheese and soft cheese. The author also goes through making whey cheese, goat cheese and sheep cheese. There is one set of colour photos and the text is interspersed with some black and white photos.
Home Dairy – Ashley English – Lark Crafts (US) 2011 ISBN 978 1 60059 627 8 – This more recent book covers the history , ingredients and equipment, including equipment for making butter, ice cream and yogurt as well as cheese. It goes on to cover the home production of butter and ghee, cultured dairy like buttermilk, yogurt and keffir; cheese and ice cream followed by (of all things) dairy based body care recipes. Not as information dense as some books but good simple instructions and lots of colour photos. Also include DIY instructions for making a cheese press and traditional “mother” cheese culture.
The Home Creamery – Kathy Farrell-Kingsley – Storey Publishing (US) 2008 ISBN 978 1 60342 031 0 – There is a cursory coverage of ingredients and equipment, a bit more detailed coverage of cultured dairy products including sour cream, crème fraiche and quark and a section on soft, unripened cheeses. There is nothing on semi-hard or hard cheese and half the book is taken up with recipes of what you can do with the dairy products once you have made them. The book is not particularly information dense, has no photos and only a few line drawings.
Home Cheesemaking – Ricki Carroll – Storey Publishing (US) 2002 ISBN 1 58017 464 7 – The book has a good coverage of ingredients and equipment required for cheesemaking and an excellent review of cheesemaking technique with lots of line drawings. What then follows is a series of 75 recipes for home made hard and soft cheeses with some stuff about cultured dairy products thrown in. The book finishes off with a small selection of recipes showing how to use the cheese. There are no photos, but good line drawings where they are needed.
Cheesemaking Made Easy – Ricki & Robert Carroll – Storey books (US) 1982 – ISBN 0 88266 267 8 – This is the previous edition of “Home cheesemaking” covered above. It is a smaller volume with 60 or so cheese recipes and a relatively greater coverage of ingredients, equipment and processes. With lots of black and white phots and detailed line drawings it is an ideal book to start out with.
Making Your Own Cheese – Paul Peacock – Spring hill House (UK) 2010 – ISBN 978 1 905862 48 1 – there is a good section on cheesemaking, for want of a better term, theory called “how cheese is made”, the section on ingredients is good but the section equipment is fairly poorly illustrated with a few low quality line drawings. This is followed by a section on the home production of almost 50 cheeses with detailed step by step instructions, but no illustrations. There are no photos and only a small number of line drawings.
