Sour Cream with the Aromatic B Cheese Culture

by Jerri

The Aromatic B Cheese Culture* can be used for many cheeses, like goat milk chevre, or cow milk for Havarti or Baby Swissbut until I get my hands regularly on Non-Ultra Pasteurized or raw goat milk, or a cheese press, and cheese cave to age the more difficult cow milk cheeses, I can use the Aromatic B Cheese Culture for cottage cheese and sour cream. Let’s do sour cream!

To make sour cream is fairly easy:

Heat 1 quart regularly pasteurized cream to 72ºF
Sprinkle Aromatic B Cheese Culture on the surface of the cream and let rehydrate 1-2 minutes
Mix in the culture
Maintain 72ºF and culture for 12-24 hours

My friend said it might take longer for the Aromatic B, so I planned to let it go up to 48 hours if needed. I started at about 7:30 p.m. on a Thursday night. With it being winter, the kitchen is a steady 65º. This proves to be a difficult temperature for making mesophilic cheese, so I wrapped up my pot of milk in an emergency blanket, and a towel around that.

At 9:00 a.m. Friday, the temperature had dropped to 68ºF. Being that I was just about 13 ½ hours in, I threw a box and a heating pad into the mix.

About 17 hours in, I finally maintained a temperature of 72-73º. By Friday night, 27 hours in, the cream was thicker! But, not really any taste to it. Bah! I let it go another 12 hours until about 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, 39 hours in, and it was the same, no real sour taste to it. Again, Bah! At 7:30 p.m. I planned to check it. Next thing I knew, it’s 10:30 p.mYIKES! So 51 hours in, and whaddya know? Sour-sour-sour-sour! It was not very thick like I’d expect, but the taste was spectacular.

My hope was that it’d thicken up in the fridge.

In the morning on Sunday, it was indeed thicker!

I was so pleased! It’s still not as thick as I’d like, but thicker than cream, and it’s sour. It’s the perfect condiment for, “It’s leftovers” night! Doesn’t sour cream make everything better? Get the Aromatic B Cheese Culture for sour cream, and Get Fermented!

* Note: Aromatic B Cheese Culture can also be used to culture cream to make cultured butter or buttermilk! Stay tuned!