Ascott press
This press, which is available in two sizes, can be bought from Ascott Smallholding Supplies Ltd. It is particularly useful as it doubles up not only as a fruit press but also for cheese. You can also press terrines.
The press has an aluminium frame and a stainless steel inner container, which can be used as a cheese mould. However, it is recommended that you use a separate plastic mould and Ascott's largest hard cheese mould fits perfectly into the larger of the two presses. You can, of course, use smaller moulds if you wish. It is not suitable for use with soft cheese moulds as they cannot withstand the pressure of the press.
At the moment, I am trying to establish how much milk is needed to make a cheese which will fill the largest mould. I started by using just 6.5 litres of milk and the resulting cheese is only 2 cm high, although it has a diameter of 18 cm (see top right). The mould is 15 cm high, so I would estimate that about 45 litres of milk would be required to make a big cheese.
This obviously requires access to a saucepan large enough to take that quantity of milk and at the moment, I am awaiting delivery of a 20 litre saucepan so will update this page when I have made my next cheese.
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Discoid Caephilly made with 6.5 litres of milk
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Terrine pressed in the cheese press
