Cheese

Making cheese is actually pretty easy and cheap. There are lots of different recipes, because, well there are lots of types of cheese - but cheesemaking.com is a good place to go for recipes and materials and equipment. 

Equipment (nothing fancy): 

• a stainless steel pot (the lactic acid will react with an aluminum pot)

• something to stir with

• a kitchen thermometer

• a long knife or long flat icing spatula to cut the curds

• cheese molds - generally plastic baskets with holes to let the liquid whey escape

• some thin cloth or handkerchiefs to wrap the curds in the molds

• some heavy stuff to press cheese

Ingredients: also pretty simple:

• milk. I usually use whole milk from the grocery store because it's cheap and readily available and works fine. I have tried raw milk, and maybe got more cheese per gallon of milk - but it costs ten times as much, and you have to age it at least 60 days.

• live culture. I use cultured buttermilk or cultured plain yogurt - look for the word "cultured" on the container.

• rennet. This is what coagulates the liquid milk into solid curds. I started with "Junket Rennet Tablets" from Kroger, on the tippy top shelf across from the Jello/baking stuff, but also have used liquid rennet from cheesemaking.com

• salt

Basic Process: go get an actual recipe, but the basic process is mostly the same

• heat milk - something like to 86F for mesophilic (grows at medium temperature) culture like cultured buttermilk or 96F for thermophilic (grows at high temperature) cultures like plain cultured yogurt

• add the culture (I use maybe  1/2C of buttermilk or yogurt per gallon)

• wait 30-60 minutes to let the culture get started

• add rennet

• wait 45-60 minutes

• use the knife to try to lift a bit of curds. If it's too soft, wait some more.

• cut the curds into cubes the size indicated in the recipe

• cook the curds by heating the pot back up for the period of time and at the temperature shown in the recipe while occasionally stirring gently. When it's done cooking it should look and feel like scrambled eggs - see picture #1 above.

• separate the solid curds from the leftover liquid whey in the manner as described in the recipe. The easiest way, and what I usually do, is scoop the curds out so that I can save the whey to make ricotta.

• put the curds into your molds and press like the recipe says - see picture 2 & 3 above.

• somewhere in the process you need to add salt - usually it's either a) stirred into the loose curds before they are put into the molds, OR more likely b) after the cheese is pressed then the cheese is soaked in a salt brine for some number of hours. The recipe will say.

• preserve and age the cheese. I usually vacuum seal mine, but you can also dip it in wax, or just go natural and let the rind form a tough exterior that keeps the inside good. Store around 50-55F and age it for how and as long as the recipe says, or until you can't wait and eat it early!

• Also, if you save the leftover liquid whey in the pot on the stove overnight, and heat it to 203F the next morning, then after it cools you will have ricotta - which literally means "recooked".