Recipe Easy Cheese

[Ellyn]

I'd always been fascinated by cheese making, but put off by such scientific-sounding sophisticated components such as rennet enzymes or rennet tablets.

Fortunately, I recently found out that there is a cheese that I'm quite fond of already--that is actually very simple and easy to make at home. The one thing it basically does is curdle cooking milk and gather the curds. The fattier the milk, the better.

1000 mL milk
3 tsp sea salt
3 Tbsp citrus juice (lemon, lime, or even key lime)
1 Tbsp vinegar (slightly less if apple cider vinegar)

Heat the milk on a very low fire, add salt and stir constantly to prevent a heated film from rising. After it's been heating for about five minutes, stir in the lemon juice. After one minute, add the vinegar.

Continue heating and slowly stirring until the milk more or less solidifies. Take off the heat and let it cool, then strain through a cheesecloth. What should be left is quite a lot of particularly sour buttermilk, which I suppose you can save and re-use for another recipe.

These curds create a cottage cheese or feta cheese like variety. They spoil quite quickly, so keep refrigerated at very low temperature, maybe 20 degrees Celsius, or eat right away.

 

[Lostvalleyguy]

This looks interesting just to try out. I imagine using an infused vinegar might give the cheese a particular flavour. I always love using my kitchen as a science lab so I might give this a try. While this wouldn't be strictly cheese without the rennet, it might be a good substitute. I am not sure about your "low" temperature as 20 degrees Celsius is a comfortable room temperature. I keep my refrigerator at about 4 degrees.

 

[skywatcher]

Oooh, these are interesting. As a cheese lover, I've got to try this out, hehe. Now I've just got to buy the ingredients and I might try making a cheese sandwich out of this, too, hehe.

 

[Sweetkymom]

Oooh, I've always wanted to make cheese! I need to go buy up some ingredients then I should be able to make this. I wonder if sharp cheddar would be hard to make?!?

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Oooh, I've always wanted to make cheese! I need to go buy up some ingredients then I should be able to make this. I wonder if sharp cheddar would be hard to make?!?

Yes - it needs a long maturation time.

Soft, young cheese is easy to make at home, like this one, (and very nice when flavoured with things such as garlic and herbs) but strong cheddars are another matter entirely.

When I have tried it in the past, my results were usually a softer cheese such as Wensleydale or Cheshire, or even I herb roulette, but never anything like a cheddar even in its mildest form I am afraid.

It can also be made with both goat's and sheeps' milk as well and given that both of these are higher in fat content than cow's milk, the yield tends to be higher, though there is nothing stopping you adding single or double cream to the above recipe to increase the fat content.

 

[Ellyn]

I am not sure about your "low" temperature as 20 degrees Celsius is a comfortable room temperature. I keep my refrigerator at about 4 degrees.

Whoops, yes, I should have said below 20 degrees (far below, by the sound of it) but I usually just eat it when it's solid and molded.

Oooh, these are interesting. As a cheese lover, I've got to try this out, hehe. Now I've just got to buy the ingredients and I might try making a cheese sandwich out of this, too, hehe.

This is actually a recipe for white cheese, so it probably works best with kalabaw (water buffalo) milk. It seems that if you get the timing wrong, you get cottage cheese instead, but I wouldn't know the difference.

Oooh, I've always wanted to make cheese! I need to go buy up some ingredients then I should be able to make this. I wonder if sharp cheddar would be hard to make?!?

Ah, that I would know the difference from--cheddar and soft white cheese--and, yes, cheddar if I recall correctly requires enzymes and rennet tablets as well as a maturation period in the correct conditions as SatNav pointed out... and then probably waxing.

 

[Meerkat80]

I also enjoy making cheese at home. Most are pretty simple.
Option 1. With the cheese above you can try to season it with pepper or herbs and either hang it in the cheesecloth overnight or press it a homemade cheesepress (I use a food tin with both ends removed and some weight on top).. This will make a very nice Feta.
Option 2. You can also drain some more of the whey and microwave it at short 30sec bursts, while stretching it with some spoons to make mozzarella.

 

[firelily99]

Thanks for the recipe, it sounds like something that would do well with any number of things added to it. I love soft cheeses blended with things like dill as well as garlic and other herbs.