Lessons in Cheese Making....Let Nature Get Involved

Sometimes we don’t plan on creating a masterpiece…it just appears out of nowhere, as if the conditions are ripe for it. This word (masterpiece) is not used lightly either….I am seriously pleased with myself!

During the past week I had saved up my 3 liters of milk from our goats with the grand plan to make some cheese for the weekend. One morning I proceeded to take it out of the fridge and then forgot all about it until late that night….

Because I was going to make cheese with it, I just left it out and thought I would get it sorted the next morning. It’s been busy this past week or so with the garden, goats and market - and you know how time just slips by.

So, the next morning, I got the milk into a pot and inoculated it with the bacteria (once it was at the right temperature) and then waited and waited and waited…until another 24 hours had passed and nothing.

The milk did not curdle into curds and whey. But by this time it was starting to thicken and go a bit sour….so I thought, oh well….just throw some rennet in there and hope for the best?

That is exactly what I did. Only I added such a tiny amount of rennet (because less is always more for me!) it might or might not work to separate the milk into curds and whey…..

After about 5 or 6 hours I checked the pot and I had a nicely formed thickish yogurt like curd. I had read somewhere that this might make a nice cheese…so I scooped it out and let the whey drain off for a few more hours.

Even as I was scooping it out – I was thinking how I liked the texture of this and it smelled wonderful! I let the liquid whey drain out for the next few hours or so and then placed the cheese into a dish, salted it and as an after thought, added some cranberries….

24 hours later, we tasted it – the best cheese I have made so far! It has a lovely texture, wonderful flavour and is better then anything I have ever bought from a shop.

Lesson for me here….let nature get involved….don’t push things because we are running short on time or want to hurry things along. The milk had already grown it’s own bacterial culture, adding the few grains of rennet just gave it a little boost and voila –

Beautiful cheese!!

April

Homemade Chevre on wholegrain toast....Yumm!