We had extra milk today so I decided to make some cheese. My mom had given me this recipe for Ricotta Cheese some time ago, I have made it quite a few times and it is quite easy.
You take your raw milk (however much you want, I usually do around 2 quarts). Heat it to around 200 degrees (this is almost boiling, past the scum on the top stage- when you see it rolling a little under the scum). At this point add around 1/4 cup vinegar and stir.
It will separate into curds and whey. Strain out the curds.
I use a colander with a dish dish towel in it (shown over a bucket to catch the whey). You can either let all the whey out (let it drain a while) to make a rather solid cheese or leave a little whey in to make a runnier mixture. Then you can add a little butter and 1/2 teaspoon soda to the curds and stir it well. I also like to add some salt and maybe some garlic for flavor. There you go, you are all done! This cheese can be used in Lasagna or we enjoy eating it on crackers. My mom also make some really yummy crackers that have this cheese in them.
3 comments:
OK - that is WAY over my homemaking ambition - but you totally rock for doing this and posting about it!! How very very cool!!
I could not be more motivated to try this. I think I might just have to give it a whirl. You make it sound so easy. Is there a way though that I can try it using 'store bought milk' because I know you get yours from a farm that probably still has all the fat in it. Does the fat count matter? I'm assuming it does.
I think it would work fine using store bought milk because I remember reading in the Tightwad Gazette about her using old sour milk which I am pretty sure was from the store. I should say though that I tried basically that recipe with sour milk from the store last month and it turned out a little funny, but maybe I did something wrong. About fat content, I had skimmed off all the cream before I used the milk for cheese so that would have lowered the fat content and it worked fine. Mostly my Mom and I have used this recipe for goats milk.
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