How the Five Compare on the Numbers
These five kits differ most in what the maker states is inside the box. New England Cheesemaking Supply Company publishes a thermometer, 3 ounces of citric acid, 3 ounces of cheese salt, 5 vegetable rennet tablets, and 1 yard of butter muslin. Standing Stone Farms publishes a reusable curd drain cloth and a yield of 10 to 15 pounds. Fermentaholics publishes 4 microbial rennet tablets, 100g cheese salt, 100g citric acid, and 1 yard of grade 90 cheesecloth.
The two mold kits take a different approach. Country Trading Co. publishes 2 square molds and 3 round molds plus a recipe book, while Grand Way publishes one mold with a follower, a 39 by 36 inch cotton cloth, and a 1.5 L capacity. The Big Cheese Making Kit publishes rennet, citric acid, sea salt, 5 spices, 3 molds, a thermometer, butter muslin, and a recipe book, but no dimensions or weight.
The table does not tell you how any kit performs in a kitchen, because nobody at Lush has used these kits. It also leaves out The Big Cheese Making Kit, which publishes no dimensions or weight. The figures above are what the makers state, and the empty cells are figures the makers do not publish.
What Each Kit Is Built to Make
Kits with a published yield
Standing Stone Farms publishes that its kit makes 10 to 15 pounds of cheese and lists recipes for ricotta, mascarpone, cottage cheese, chevre, cream cheese, and mozzarella. It also publishes a reusable curd drain cloth. The maker states that cheese can be made in as little as 20 minutes and that the kit uses non-GMO rennet. It does not publish a batch count.
New England Cheesemaking Supply Company publishes 20 one pound batches and states mozzarella can be made in 30 minutes. Its contents are 3 ounces of citric acid, 3 ounces of cheese salt, 5 tablets of vegetable rennet, 1 yard of butter muslin, a thermometer, and a recipe booklet. It does not publish a total yield in pounds.
Kits built around tools
Country Trading Co. publishes 2 square molds and 3 round molds of different sizes plus a complete recipe book. The molds are made in Italy from BPA free plastic and are described as dishwasher safe. The kit does not publish rennet, salt, citric acid, or a cloth, so a reader would need those separately for a recipe that calls for them.
Grand Way publishes one cheese mold with a press follower, a 39 by 36 inch cotton cheesecloth, and a mold capacity of 1.5 L. The mold is made from food grade polypropylene and is described as designed to sustain cheese press weights. The kit does not publish rennet, salt, or citric acid, and it does not publish a batch count.
Ingredients, Cloth, and Molds
Ingredient kits
Fermentaholics publishes 4 microbial rennet tablets, 100g cheese salt, 100g citric acid, 1 yard of grade 90 cheesecloth, and a recipe book with 7 recipes. It publishes 0.22 pounds in its weight field, the lightest figure of the five picks, and 7.23 ounces in its size attribute, which is not the same weight. It does not publish a batch count or a total yield.
Fermentaholics and New England Cheesemaking Supply Company are the only two picks that publish a full ingredient list. New England gives 3 ounces of citric acid, 3 ounces of cheese salt and 5 vegetable rennet tablets. Fermentaholics gives 100g of each and 4 tablets. So one publishes its salt and acid in ounces and the other in grams, and neither states a batch size for the quantity.
Cloth and mold details
Three picks publish a cloth: New England Cheesemaking Supply Company lists 1 yard of butter muslin, Fermentaholics lists 1 yard of grade 90 cheesecloth, and Grand Way lists a 39 by 36 inch cotton cloth. Standing Stone Farms publishes a reusable curd drain cloth without a size. Country Trading Co. does not publish a cloth.
Two picks publish molds: Country Trading Co. with 2 square and 3 round molds, and Grand Way with one mold and a follower. The Big Cheese Making Kit also publishes 3 cheese molds. The other two picks do not publish molds. Only Grand Way publishes a mold capacity, at 1.5 L.
Where the Published Figures Disagree
One kit publishes two different weights
Fermentaholics publishes 0.22 pounds in its weight field and 7.23 ounces in its size attribute. Those are not the same figure: 7.23 ounces is 0.45 pounds, roughly double the weight field. Nothing in the listing reconciles them, so a buyer cannot tell whether the box is a quarter of a pound or closer to half.
The other four publish one weight each and nothing contradicts it: Standing Stone Farms 0.81 pounds, New England Cheesemaking Supply Company 0.5, Country Trading Co. 0.44 and Grand Way 0.4. All five publish three dimension figures as well, and Country Trading Co.’s 4.65 by 4.65 by 6.1 inches is the only one of the five recorded as a package size rather than the kit itself.
What the dimension fields do not mean
A kit is a bag of sachets in a box, so its published dimensions describe the box and not the cheese. New England Cheesemaking Supply Company publishes 2.5 by 9.25 by 8.5 inches, Standing Stone Farms 6 by 9 by 2, Fermentaholics 9 by 2 by 6 and Grand Way 5.9 by 5.9 by 2.76. Only the Grand Way figure describes a tool you use.
That matters because two of the five are tools rather than ingredient boxes. The Grand Way mold publishes 5.9 by 5.9 by 2.76 inches and a 1.5 L capacity, so the figure and the capacity describe the same object. The Country Trading Co. five mold set publishes neither a capacity nor an individual mold size, only a 4.65 by 4.65 by 6.1 inch package, so its five molds of different sizes are unmeasured.
Which One Fits Your Kitchen
First time mozzarella maker. The New England Cheesemaking Supply Company kit publishes a thermometer and 20 one pound batches, so it covers the first recipe and many after it.
Cook who wants a larger yield. Standing Stone Farms publishes 10 to 15 pounds of cheese and a reusable curd drain cloth, with recipes for six fresh cheeses.
Small kitchen or gift buyer. Fermentaholics publishes a weight of 0.22 pounds and includes rennet tablets, salt, citric acid, and cheesecloth in one box.
Cook who wants to shape cheese. Country Trading Co. publishes 2 square molds and 3 round molds plus a recipe book, all in a set that measures 4.65 by 4.65 by 6.1 inches.
Cook who wants a press follower. Grand Way publishes a mold with a follower, a 39 by 36 inch cotton cloth, and a 1.5 L mold capacity.
What We Could Not Verify
Several figures are not published by the makers, and we did not estimate them.
- Why Fermentaholics publishes 0.22 pounds in one field and 7.23 ounces in another for the same kit.
- Standing Stone Farms, Fermentaholics, Country Trading Co., and Grand Way do not publish a batch count.
- Country Trading Co. and Grand Way do not publish rennet, salt, or citric acid in their contents.
- Fermentaholics, Country Trading Co., and Grand Way do not publish a stated make time.
- A mold capacity or an individual mold size from Country Trading Co., which publishes only a package figure.
- No kit publishes a tested performance figure, because none of these kits has been used by anyone at Lush.
