# Mesophylic mother culture question



## Vickivail98 (Sep 26, 2014)

Hello, I'm newish to cheese making and want to start trying farmhouse cheddar. I've been researching ways to make my cultures last longer and would like to make and freeze a mother culture, not to continue on forever but to make the hard to get ahold of packets last a few batches instead of one. My question is, if the mother recipe makes a quart and I need 4 oz per batch, is there a reason that I can't just freeze my excess in sterilized 4 oz glass jars??


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## Vickivail98 (Sep 26, 2014)

I decided to try it, what the heck. Will update about how it goes! 


Mommy in Michigan


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## danil54grl (Mar 10, 2014)

I have read that you can freeze it. I used to use the direct set (dry powder that I had to order online), but after that I started using a buttermilk mother culture instead with better tasting results in my opinion, but your yield is slightly less. If interested, put 1/4 cup cultured buttermilk into 3 3/4 cup pasteurized milk. Leave out 24 hours, shake up and then refrigerate. I make 4 quarts at a time and use 1 quart for each 4 - 5 gallons of milk. Once I have two quarts left, I make another 'mother culture' with the last quart.


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