I have to admit that home cheese making feels a bit like conducting a chemistry experiment in my kitchen.
I mean, with bread baking, I can FEEL the dough. There is some effort behind the whole affair of mixing flour, water, yeast and other ingredients, watching it rise, kneading and watching it rise again before shaping it with your hands into a final, glorious loaf.
With home cheese making, you do quite a lot of waiting about. You mix in special ingredients that you must special order. Everything must be kept immaculately clean and sanitary. The guru of cheese making, Ricki Carroll, even recommends keeping meticulous notes in a cheese making journal.
Nevertheless, the results of home cheese making can’t be denied.
Take a look at this 30 Minute Mozzarella that I made last night with some of the last tomatoes and basil of the year. (In our Zone 7 garden we picked about 10 lovely tomatoes just yesterday!)
This salad LOOKS like art, doesn’t it?
The recipe is from, of course, Home Cheese Making, by Ricki Carroll. I have been slowly working my way through the book, starting with the soft, spreadable cheeses. Now that my fancy cheese press has arrived, I am venturing into the hard cheeses.
You can’t really count this 30 Minute Mozzarella as a hard cheese. And frankly, it’s a lot less work than even the soft cheeses. In fact, it’s ridiculously easy.
If you are even a little bit interested in cheese making, then place an order with the New England Cheesemaking Supply Company and give this recipe a whirl. I highly recommend that you buy the book because the introductory information is quite important, particularly information about sanitation, ingredients and heating of the milk.
Look how easy the whole process was. I used the recipe from Ricki Carroll’s Home Cheese Making.
Ingredients I Used:
1 ½ level teaspoon citric acid dissolved in ¼ cup cool water
1 gallon pasteurized whole milk
¼ teaspoon liquid rennet diluted in ¼ cup cool, unchlorinated water
1 teaspoon cheese salt
How I Did It:
I added the citric acid/water solution to the milk when it was at 55 degrees and mixed it thoroughly but gently. I slowly heated the milk on the stove to 88 degrees. (It helps that I have a gas stove, I think, because it gives me a great deal of immediate control over heat.) I gently added the diluted rennet and mixed again and then heated the milk to 100 degrees.
I scooped the curds from the pot into a microwaveable bowl and pressed to remove the extra whey. (If you are very clever, apparently you can reserve the whey for other cheese making purposes.)
I microwaved the curds on high for 1 minute and again drained off all the excess whey. To distribute the heat evenly, I gently folded the cheese over and over like I was kneading bread. I microwaved the cheese twice again for 35 seconds each, kneading after each turn. Then I added the salt, kneading it to incorporate it into the cheese.
The recipe says cheese won’t stretch properly until it’s almost too hot to handle. I found it very hot, but if I moved quickly, it didn’t feel like it was burning at all. I kneaded until the cheese was smooth and elastic. It became nice and stretchy.
(Unfortunately, I can’t knead and take photos at the same time and the two men in my house were busy reading. It was difficult to entice one of them into the kitchen to play photographer.)
I rolled the cheese into small balls and placed them into the frig to cool.
The directions say to put them into a bowl of cold/ice water to bring down the heat if you don’t plan to eat them warm, but I forgot that part. Nevertheless, they were just dandy about 30 minutes later when I made the salad.
What do you think? Does this look like art? Craft? Chemistry experiment? Would you give it a try?
Robin
I am happy to report that, so far at least, mushrooms grown intentionally seem to grow as rapidly as those grown unintentionally, i.e. those that grow in your lawn.
Remember how I just started my mushroom patch a couple of days ago? Well, lookee here.
That shiitake mushroom is about the size of racketball!
Take another look. (This is the beauty shot.)
I mist the mushroom patch about twice a day, although the instructions tell you to mist it “several times a day.” I do keep the humidity tent in place. And although you might think that the mushroom patch should reside in a dark closet, the instructions say that you just need to keep it out of direct light. So that I don’t forget it and accidentally kill all those precious mushroom spores, my mushroom patch is living on the floor of the kitchen next to the cabinets. So far, the little dogs have taken no interest.
In other news about pet projects…
Remember Steve Martin in the movie The Jerk excitedly yelling, “The new phone book is here!!! The new phone book is here!!!”
I did my own Jerk impression the other day, yelling “The new cheese press is here!!! The new cheese press is here!!!”
The little dogs were confused, but unimpressed. I think the UPS guy was just a wee bit curious about why I was skipping back to the house with the box.
I waited about three or four months for this cheese press from the New England Cheesemaking Supply, which was having some vendor issues getting these made. They were excellent about communicating the difficulties and I decided to hold out for this cheese press. I have been working my way through Ricki Carroll’s book on Home Cheese Making with excellent results, so I trusted the source. In fact, we have become addicted to all sorts of homemade soft cheeses thanks to Ricki. My friend Angela said the neufchatel is like crack and she can’t stop eating it.
Off to adventures in cheese making now!
Ciao!
Robin
I don’t believe that most people who meet me think first of a farm girl. So I’m particularly delighted to report on my latest farm girl activities–just to prove it IS so.
I started this weekend by starting my second batch of cheese. My first batch was neufchatel, strictly following the book’s recipe. This time I made the same recipe, but omitting the cream, making a lighter version of the cheese. Both are–if I say so myself–fabulous.
Benjamin and I have eaten all of the first batch ourselves. I mixed it with garlic and herbs from the garden and we have eaten it on crackers as snacks. The second batch will be used for an absolutely sinful Italian Creme cake in lieu of the cream cheese in the frosting. (I might even post the recipe–one of my favorites.)
Home made neufchatel cheese
Who knew cheese making could be so easy?!? So far, at least, it seems to consist largely of having the right ingredients (starter, good milk or cream and various other things such as rennet), a REALLY clean kitchen and utensils (not a problem, as my mother-in-law has a favorite “out, out damn spot” joke about me) and waiting around, at which I happen to excel.
I bought the ingredients for creme fraiche today. I am also ordering more supplies from the New England Cheese Making Supply Company to make mozzarella and ricotta.
Embarrassment of riches–farm girl style
Next, I was faced with an embarrassment of riches–a whole bunch of cucumbers. I considered (briefly) giving some away, since our little family of three couldn’t possibly eat them all since there are even more on the way. So I pulled out my latest book purchases from Barnes and Noble and found a new bread and butter pickle recipe. (I plan to post a review of book soon.)
I have made bread and butter pickles a couple of times before. The first time, I was in my twenties and was living in an un-air conditioned house in Norfolk, Virginia. I was DYING with the heat in the kitchen from the huge canning kettle and the gas stove. When I had finished, I had about 20 jars of pickles that I had originally planned to give as gifts and share.
Hah! After all the work of planting, growing and pickling, I DID NOT SHARE A SINGLE JAR. I ate them all myself!
Well, this time wasn’t so bad.
Cucumbers and onions in pickling brine
I had the advantage of air conditioning and a mandolin grater this time that made the preparations so much more convenient and comfortable. In the end, I had about 10 jars of pickles. Will I share? Maybe. Just just a little. Even with a handy dandy Japanese mandolin grater and air conditioning, it’s still a lot of work!
Bread and butter pickles
Finally, just to top off my farm girl report…
I was watering in the garden yesterday and what did I find? MY FIRST TOMATO OF THE SEASON!!!!
I have been a very avid fan of heirloom tomatoes. But this year I planted a couple of varieties of hybrid tomatoes, including Better Boy and Early Girl. And waddaya know? The Early Girl produced the first tomato.
First tomato of the season, 2007
She’s not really all that impressive. Harry tried to put her in the salad last night and I objected STRENUOUSLY. Really, it would have gotten lost. I will eat her tomorrow from my hand with only a little salt for dressing.
Ciao!
Robin
