Cold Smokin’ Cheese: Cheddar & more

When it’s cold outside, it’s time to do some cold smoking. I like it because it adds a (usually) subtle smokiness to one of Mrs. ForensicBBQ and I’s favorite foods. She’s been asking for a cheese stockpile for awhile now, so it was that time.

All I use my RecTeq smoker for is a capsule. I don’t turn it on, I just use it to hold and spread the smoke. When you’re looking at it, I start a small fire on the left and it vents out the right: Filling up that smoker and gliding across the food. There’s really nothing to it, and it yields an absolutely positive result. Let’s go!

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Recipe

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The Prep Table

I FINALLY picked up these racks after years of using frogmats for everything. I still love my mats, but wanted to get some good racks for jerky, bacon, and in this case: cheese.

We went a little crazy here with the tray, but if you’re going to do it, let’s do it. I needed that Tillamook Pepper Jack, as it’s always my favorite go-to cheese. Wife wanted that Cheddar, and anything else not hot (not much on here).

Starting at the upper-left going clockwise, we got: Habanero Jack, Pepper Jack, Mozzarella, Scorpion Pepper Gouda, Cotija, Cheddar, Smoked Gouda and Swiss.

I never smoked mozzarella nor cotija, so these were new additions. I know what to expect out of the jack cheese, and double-smoking the plain Gouda was going to be a hopefully pleasant experience.

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The Process

I like to cut them up into smaller pieces to get a little more smoke to the cheese. Adding another edge, another spot for the smoke to penetrate, gets a pretty good result. So we halved them, quartered the Swiss, and got the smoker ready.

I use the A-MAZE-N pellet tube to accomplish the task. You can find a list of the equipment I use over at my About page, where I also credit my usual recipe sources.

Really simple process here.. fill the tube up with pellets, I think for this bout we went with Pecan wood. (I think, you’ll see it’s not the smoke that takes awhile, it’s the wait – so I can’t recall). I pack the tube up and take a torch to it. Let it burn for a little while and build up the fire. Once you have a good one started, close up the smoker and it’ll usually kill the flame and the smoldering begins.

So there ya go. You’re officially smoking cheese now. This will only take about 2 hours. I check on it after the first 15 minutes to make sure it’s still smoking, but you should hopefully see the smoke venting out. Keep the lid shut so that chamber is constantly filled with smoke. If you want a lighter, subtle smoky flavor, knock your time back. I’ve had great results with 2 hours, so that’s my go-to.

There’s no need to do anything other than wait. You’re filling that entire smoker with smoke, so it’s getting it at all angles. There’s no heat zones to watch out for, it’s just a waiting game. But the real waiting game is coming up.

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The Result

There’s not going to be an epic finished picture for this post. Cheese is cheese and smoked cheese is just a little darker. I’ll reserve this space to the post smoker procedure.

Once the cheese is back, it’s time to treat it with care. I love me some butcher paper – especially with my briskets – so we’re using it here. This will allow the cheese to breathe a little bit instead of trapping it. You basically beat the hell out of the edges with the smoke, so we want it to chill out and let that smoke settle throughout the cheese. Wrap it up and pop it in the fridge for a day or two.

Hey, don’t eat it right away. That smoke is gonna bite you in the ass, it’ll taste like a mouth full of ashes. It’ll be so overpowering it’ll ruin your experience. Let it be. It only took you two hours of waiting, what’s another couple of days?

I lied. After a 2 days, we took them out of the paper and sealed them up. We make good use of the vacuum sealer, and today was no exception. Get that nice seal on there, let your creative wife label the cheese however she sees fit, and put it back in the fridge for two weeks.

Two WEEKS?

Yeah, a lot of two’s here. 2 hour smoke, 2 day breathe, 2 week sleep. But as soon as you crack one open and try a piece, makes it all worthwhile. My favorite were the Mozzarella and Cotija surprisingly, the two I bought a whim. I knew what to expect out of the jack cheese, and the Gouda is already familiar. But damn, that Motz was killer. We ended up cubing them, giving a bunch out (we’re a friendly people) and our fridge is now graced with that home-smoked cheese.

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Bonus SMOKE

So after we wrapped up that cheese, I left that grill outside until the tube burnt itself out. It was still pushing a lot of smoke, and I was having my usual post-smoke victory drink: Two fingers of Jameson in a Glencairn.

I bet I could smoke it.

I think I left it in there for no more than 5 minutes. I just wanted the smoke to kiss it, it’s a liquid – it was gonna get hit hard.

I’ll be damned. That was a phenomenal experiment gone right. I was pleasantly surprised, but also wouldn’t do it every time. Was a great day of smoking. You guessed it, I had a post-victory drink after my post-victory drink/smoke.

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The Recipe