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!

Homemade Chèvre Cheese....Yumm!

It has been an interesting few months experimenting with cheese making – and I am learning/discovering so much about this lovely wonder of nature. Hopefully I will soon get it right every time.

What I am finding is how it is temperature sensitive, environment sensitive, cannot be rushed and responds even to the most subtle changes. Perhaps it’s me as well – the milk even seems different from day to day too.

Of course I am using our own raw goats milk – so depending on what the goats are eating over the course of a few days their milk might be a little more or less thick with fat.

And, most of all I am being shown so much about nature, how the environment interacts with the animals and then how they respond to us and us to them. Their care is so important for our daily food…

I have been doing this (involved with meat, food, farming etc.) a long time and yet I am learning or perhaps broadening my understanding of food production each and every day. But all that aside….

Learning how to make these new foods is the most fun I’ve had in a while. My cheese making is not the success I hope for each and every time I go to make it, but the end result is always edible.

So far my best cheeses have been the feta and this week I made a chevre that is gorgeous (if I do say so myself!). The feta cheese I salted and then brined for about 1 week before it was placed in olive oil.

This time with the chevre I wanted something a little different so I formed it into a mould with my favourite fig and orange jam. It is so lovely! The chevre cheese is slightly sharp, so when paired together with the sweet jam is such a nice combination.

Who knows what I will be doing next….

April

Chevre goat's cheese with Fg and Orange Jam 

Homemade Feta Cheese - made with Goats Milk

Today I am making feta cheese with my goat’s milk – this is an easy cheese to make but can also be kept for awhile once it’s ready. Because I am still fasting, I thought this one would be the best to make right now.

To make feta cheese I started with 2 liters of fresh goats milk from our goats and rummaged around the kitchen until I found 2 pots that would work well as a double boiler. It is important to heat the milk but I didn’t want to heat it directly over a burner.

Instead, I heated water to boiling in the kettle, while the milk was brought up to room temperature. Next I set up my double boiler – placing something (a pot lid) on the bottom to steady the smaller pan holding the milk.

Then after pouring hot water into the bigger pot, I set the smaller pot (with the milk in it) onto the pot lid so it could rest in the hot water and begin to heat up. It doesn’t take long and I had to watch it carefully to make sure it would not overheat.

The temperature you are aiming for is about 30C – but this needs to be maintained for about an hour or so. Once I was at or near that temperature I added in some of my homemade vegetarian rennet (made from nettles) and I guessed at how much starter culture to add (I have a packet that says add to 150L!).

Then I stirred (very gently) while holding the candy thermometer to the one side (I do need a more accurate one for cheese making) and checking the temperature making sure I was keeping it in the right range.

After 20 minutes or so, I removed the smaller pan and replaced some hot water to keep the temperature up. Then I stopped stirring and let it all settle for about another hour or so.

I had to stop watching it (LOL) so I went to do something else – then when I came back it had started to turn into the familiar curds and whey. But was not quite ready yet because it was not giving a clean break.

What I was looking for was for the curd to become a little solid and break apart when gently cut with a knife. Or even to not stick to my finger when gently pushed down.

Within another 15 minutes this clean break started to happened and I was able to cut the curds with my knife in a crisscross pattern and then at a 45 degree angle to break up the curds underneath. Once I had done this I just let it sit for 15 to 20 minutes at a time between gentle stirs of the curd to encourage the whey to separate.

Once I was satisfied it was ready, I placed the curds and whey into a strainer covered in 5 layers of muslin cloth and allowed it to drain out into a pan for an hour or so. Then I tied up the cloth ends and the cheese is now draining/dripping into the pan while hanging from a hook.

I plan to brine this cheese – for a day or two and then to let it sit until I am finished this fast. Then I want to marinate it in olive oil and oregano and have a taste testing – can’t wait for that.

April

Feta Cheese in process...curds and whey 

Homemade Goat's Cheese - Vegetarian Rennet and Lemon Juice

On to a new chapter in living foods (and increasing healthy gut bacteria) here with some exploration in cheese making, vegetarian rennet and all things to do with working my tiny bit of goat’s milk that I am getting each day.

Right now we have one goat that is milking – she has 3 kids on her, so we don’t take (or get) very much. And another goat who is a maiden milker but is due to have her kids at the beginning of May or so.

Not much milk at the moment – but hopefully more to come soon enough. The bit I do get goes mostly to my children, however I have been saving some over the past few days to try my hand at a little farmhouse cheese.

I have gone to a couple cheese making classes and read/studied lots about this wonderful art – so this week I decided to give it a try with my precious goat’s milk. However, my plan was to started out easy and simple either way.

To begin with I decided to make my own rennet – I don’t like the thought of using rennet from another species (animal rennet usually comes from calf stomach) and goat’s are vegetarians, so I thought – make some vegetarian rennet.

There are several plants apparently that are able to provide the necessary enzymes to get cheese making off to a good start. One of them is nettle – today I boiled some nettle (it was dried from last year) for 30 minutes and allowed it to steep, then added a little salt.

I then took 1 liter of raw goat’s milk and warmed it to about 25C, added a tablespoon or so of the nettle rennet and about 3 tablespoons lemon juice and stirred for a few minutes. Then I let it sit in the stainless steel pot for about an hour or so to see what might happen.

When I checked it – I could see the separation of curds and whey – so I poured it out into a strainer covered with layers of muslin cloth and placed the strainer over a large pot to catch the dripping whey.

This sat and drained down for another hour or so – and then I scooped the solid cheese out of the cloth and placed it into a bowl. This was salted with sea salt, sprinkled with homegrown garlic chives and promptly eaten!

Yum! And it was that easy….Now onwards and upwards!

April

Homemade goat's cheese - with sea salt and garlic chives