Ultimately almost all home cheesemakers progress in their skills to the point of attempting to produce hard cheeses. The ability to make chedder cheese seems to be the golden goal of all who try. None of the unique skills learned from previous cheeses will be enough to make hard cheese. That's because hard cheese requires the use of one very specialized piece of equipment...a cheese press.

Types of Presses
There are three main types of home cheese presses, basic weighted, lever weighted and spring compression. Of these major types there are an inordinate amount of varieties, most homemade but some commercially available. The most simple of presses are made by placing the desired amount of weight (dumbbells, kitchen items, water filled jugs,etc..) on top of the curd in the pressing hoop. I can tell you from experience that while this method is free and simple it is far from reliable and sometimes tricky to setup. The biggest problem with this setup is it's difficult to keep the weight pressing in an even way. The resulting cheese is often lopsided which makes the weight want to fall over. While having it's disadvantages it is still the most cost effective way and with a bit of futzing usually gets the job done acceptably.

Lever and spring presses are usually purchased because of their complexity of design. These presses, especially the spring presses are very expensive and are not widely available. However a mechanically inclined person can usually make their own lever press with relative ease. Their design does allow for more consistency in pressing as well as more convenient use. Lever presses work by using a cantilever system of hanging the weight on progressively farther out notches. This effectively increases the weight on the curd where the plunger meets the follower without the need to add more physical weight.

A spring press works a bit differently because it does not use weights, it uses the compression of the springs to provide the necessary force. This type of press is usually made using two threaded rods as guides with two metal strips forming the press and compression bars. One bar sits on the follower and the second sits on the springs that are resting on the lower bar. Wing nuts are then tightened down on the top bar compressing the springs and putting weight on the bottom bar and follower.

Using A Press
All cheese presses, regardless of the type require the use of a forming hoop and a follower. The curd is placed into the cheese cloth lined hoop and the follower is then placed on top. The excess cloth is usually folded over before placing the follower on top. However I have had success by placing the follower directly on the curd. This method makes for a more aesthetically pleasing cheese because both sides are flat and smooth.

The prepared mold is then placed onto a draining pan and the weight applied according to the type of press being used. If you're using straight weight it helps to place the assembled press in a corner and let the walls act as guides. This works especially well if the weight your using are round plate weights. These weights also have the added benefit of being labled with their exact weight. With a lever style press the plunger is set onto the follower and weight is then hung from the appropriate notch. When using a spring press the hoop/follower is then placed on the draining board and the nuts are tightened.

Almost all pressed cheeses are pressed on specific weight schedules beginning with light weight and increased at certain intervals over hours or days. When adding weight the curd is usually removed from the assembly, flipped over and redressed with clean cheese cloth. The pressing schedules are designed to keep too much weight from being applied too soon which traps excess whey inside leading to aging problems and keeping the right consistency from being formed. Chedder cheese for example is pressed to a final weight of around 50 pounds. This creates enough pressure to expel all the whey from the tiny curds and creates the tight knit firm texture of this style cheese.