Sunday, March 1, 2009

R2R Feb09: Cheese!

Boy, do I love these Recipes To Rival challenges - bonus points for the shock value! From facebook to live conversations, I was met with disbelief when I casually mentioned that I was attempting to make cheese at home!

Based on the challenge picked by Lauren, we were given instructions to make ricotta cheese / paneer (cottage cheese) and they only needed two ingredients. Step-by-step guide below, a note of the wise - a. I used about 3 cups of milk and the end result was only about a firm handful and b. the cheese supposedly keeps for up to 4 days refrigerated (not that I would know, it got used up pretty quick).

Update (what the blurry words in the photos basically say) -
Step 1: Rule of thumb ratio 500ml fresh milk to 1 tablespoon of lemon juice. Bring milk to boil stirring constantly so it doesn't burn. Once boiling, add in lemon juice and remove off heat. Make slashing movements in one direction to mix the juice into the milk.
Step 2: Milk will begin to seperate into curds & whey. Leave aside for one to two hours for the solids to settle.
Step 3: Strain mixture into a cheese-cloth / muslin lined colander to seperate curds.
Step 4: This is how whey (the liquid) looks like. Its pretty much tasteless and usually just dumped out but bet you can find some recipes to use it (I read it makes good steak sauce).
Step 5: Tie up the cheesecloth tightly and hang overnight to drip dry.
Step 6: Voila! Homemade cheese.

6 comments:

Heather B said...

Great job! Your ricotta looks great!

Anonymous said...

Your cheese looks excellent, looks like you have the hang of this.

Anonymous said...

So to make it creamier... I wonder if the cheese shouldn't be tied up tightly in cheesecloth to drain, but just allowed to drip. I also wonder if I overheated things. Ways to experiment for next time :).

Lauren said...

looks great! thanks for participating this month!

Temperance said...

I am jealous of your whey, mine was much more milky. the ricotta looks wonderful. I don't think anyones lasted long enough to go bad.

MrOrph said...

Nicely done! I've been meaning to make homemade cheese, either mozzarella or ricotta, but haven't gotten off the sofa long enough to do it yet. Yours is an inspiration.