Cheese, Edam

⚠ UNTESTED. A briefing.

Edam is gouda’s leaner sibling: part-skim milk, so lower fat, firmer, drier — and that is not a compromise, it is the reason the cheese exists.

⭐ Lower fat is what let it travel. Fat is the part of a cheese that goes rancid; a leaner paste keeps longer, resists heat better and survives handling. Edam went to sea and around the world in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries because it was the cheese least likely to spoil on the way, and the cream that came off the milk was churned into butter and sold separately. A dairy selling two products out of one milking, with the keeping quality as the design brief.

⚠ And the famous red wax is largely an export convention, not the cheese. Edam sold domestically in the Netherlands generally wears yellow or clear paraffin; the red coat is what the world outside got, and is now so strongly associated with the name that people assume it is intrinsic. It is packaging that became identity — a pattern this collection keeps meeting.

The diagnostic detail: it is a ball, not a wheel, which is a shipping decision as much as an aesthetic one.

Ingredients

• 1 gallon whole milk plus 1 gallon skim milk (not ultra-pasteurised)
• 1/4 tsp mesophilic culture
• 1/2 tsp calcium chloride solution, if the milk is shop-bought
• 1/2 tsp liquid rennet, single strength, diluted in 1/4 cup cool unchlorinated water
• 2 quarts water at 140 F, for the wash (approximately)
• Saturated brine, calcium-adjusted — see Cheese Brine, Saturated
• Cheese wax, or a coating

Directions

Key ingredients

Salt

1. Blend whole and skim milk to land somewhere around 2-2.5% fat, and warm to 86-88 F / 30-31 C. ⚠ A leaner milk gives a more fragile gel — add calcium chloride even if the milk is good, and handle the curd a little more gently than you would for a gouda.

Mesophilic culture, 45 minutes. Rennet at a flocculation multiplier of 3.

2. Cut to 3/8 inch and stir 30 minutes, then wash exactly as for Cheese, Gouda — draw off a third of the whey, replace with water at 140 F until the vat reaches 96-100 F.

Stir another 20-30 minutes.

⚠ Drain under the whey

3. Let the curd settle into a mass at the bottom of the pot with the whey still over it, press it down with your hands or a plate, and only then gather it. Working the curd under liquid is how you keep air out of it — and air trapped between curd pieces becomes a mechanical opening, a slit or crack in the finished paste that has nothing to do with gas and everything to do with sloppy draining.
4. Mould in a round-bottomed form if you have one — a small bowl lined with cloth works. The ball shape is traditional and practical: no corners to knock off, and it packs into a crate without wasting space.
5. Press lightly — this is a leaner curd and over-pressing makes it rubbery. ~5 PSI for an hour, flip, then ~10 PSI for 6-8 hours.

Brine several hours per pound, flipping partway. Dry thoroughly, then wax.

6. Age at 50-55 F for 2 to 4 months. Edam firms and sharpens with time but never gets cheddar-sharp — the higher final pH sees to that.

Notes

Where this recipe came from — and what it isn’t 🔴 UNTESTED. ⚠ Plain Edam is generic; Edam Holland is protected.

🔴 What the wash actually does Your starter eats lactose and makes lactic acid. Left alone it keeps eating until it runs out or the acid stops it, and a cheddar ends up around pH 5.0–5.2.

Washing interrupts that. You draw off part of the whey and replace it with water, which dilutes the lactose still dissolved among the curds. Less sugar means less acid, and the cheese finishes higher — around pH 5.2–5.4.

⭐ Two-tenths of a pH point is the entire family. Higher pH leaves more calcium bound into the casein network, and bound calcium is what makes a gouda bend where a cheddar snaps. It is also why these are the best melters in the section.

⭐ And the water goes in HOT, so it raises the vat temperature and cooks the curd in the same operation. One step, two outcomes — which is the neatest piece of design in the whole craft.

⭐ Why lean travelled Fat is the fraction that oxidises and goes rancid, so a lower-fat cheese keeps longer and handles heat better. Edam was the cheese of ships and colonies for exactly that reason, and the cream skimmed off went to butter. ⚠ That makes Edam an early example of a food designed around its supply chain rather than around a table — which is not a modern idea and is worth not being sniffy about.

The red wax Largely an export convention. Domestic Dutch Edam commonly wears yellow or clear paraffin; the red coat travelled and stuck. ⭐ It now functions as brand recognition for a generic cheese, which puts it in the same category as Morbier’s ash line and American Muenster’s orange coat: an appearance that outlived, or never had, a function.

What goes wrong Rubbery — over-pressed, which a lean curd punishes faster than a rich one. Cracked or dry — the cave is too dry for a low-fat paste; these want the humid end. Bland — under-salted; a leaner cheese carries less flavour of its own and leans harder on the salt.

Read alongside /cheese/makes/semi-soft-washed-curd/ and /cheese/milk/ on the site.