Since we have recently gone back to purchasing our milk directly from the farm, we have also gone back to making our own cheese. While I have taken two different cheese making classes and have a cheese making book, we prefer the kit that you can buy at most natural food stores in the area. It has all of the necessary ingredients for mozzarella and ricotta and it means that we do not have to buy items in bulk. Simple, straightforward cheese making.
While the whole process of making cheese is pretty cool, my personal favorite is cutting the curds. For one brief moment in time, you have all these perfect little cheese squares floating around the pot. It does not last for long, as all those perfect little squares become one cheesy mass in the middle of the pot.
The last step in the process is working the remainder of the liquid out of the cheese and shaping it into the perfect ball, with just the right amount of cheese salt added. This is where things get interesting in our household, as there appears to be a major competition between Andy and myself as to who can make the smoothest, most perfect ball of mozzarella. In fact, it has become so competitive, that tonight he resorted to cheating. Once I had been lulled into a sense of victory and my cheese was comfortably chilling in cold water, Andy grabbed one of my ramekins and shaped his cheese into the perfect mold. That's OK, since we are back to buying milk from the farm there will be many more cheese making sessions for me to secure my victory.
No comments:
Post a Comment