Commercial cheese presses run fifty to a hundred dollars and do nothing a simple wooden contraption can’t.
What you need
- Two pieces of flat wood, cut to 8×8 inches
- A 1-inch hole through both plates, centered
- All-thread rod for the corners, with wing nuts
- A PVC pipe or round mold to fit between the plates
Method
- Assemble the plates with the threaded rod at the corners.
- Place the mold with curds between the plates.
- Tighten the wing nuts — the top plate compresses the curds, and whey drains into a catch bowl below.
- Calibrate pressure with a kitchen scale: tighten until it reads your desired weight, and mark positions at 10, 20, and 30 pounds.
Total cost: zero, if you have scrap lumber on hand. It will last decades.