Holy Cow

What can you do with a gallon of milk?

Wendy and I jut completed a huge cooking feat. We made cheese. Cheese that can kick African Gouda ass. I will describe how we made 1 lbs mozzarella, ice cream, a cup of ricotta, butter and buttermilk all from 5 litters of milk. Before I start with this monster, dairy-inspired blog, I have a bit of a guilt trip I need to remedy. For the mozzarella and ice cream you need a few cheap, yet hard to find ingredients, Citric acid salt and rennet tablets. You will also need a thermometer, which also might be tricky. Let me know if you can find them in UG. I feel bad because this seems to defy the “local ingredients” assumption of the blog. Here is the deal. Anyone that is inspired to make cheese, email me or post in the comments and I can get the supplies by February from the states. The rennet and citric acid cost less then 10 bucks total and can probably make like 40 lbs of cheese.

Mozzarella

Supplies

• 3.75 liters of milk (whole, unpasteurized, the more direct from cow the better)

• 1-1/4 tsp. Citric Acid Salt

• ½ rennet tablet

• 1tsb Salt

• Thermometer that you are willing to put in food

• 1 linen dishtowel

1. Warm the milk very slightly to get to 88F

2. Dissolve 1-1/4 tsp. Citric Acid Salt in ½ cup cool water. Then stir into 88F milk

3. Dissolve ½ rennet tablet in ¼ cup cool water. Also, mix this into your warm milk

4. Leave pot undisturbed until a “clean break” achieved. This could be anywhere from 1-4 hours. This is the most important step! The clean break is tested when you put your finger in the pot at an angle and pull up. If the milk will cleanly fall to either side without leaving residue on you finger, you can move to the next step.

5. Cut the curd. Make ½ inch curds by sticking a knife to the bottom of the pot and cutting lines from the back of the pot towards you and then make another set of cuts perpendicular to the previous ones.

6. Stir and keep the curds separated as you warm the pot to 108F. Hold the pot at 108F for 35 minutes and stir every 5 minutes.

7. Collect the curds by poring into a linen cloth held in a colander. Collect the whey by putting something under the colander if you wish to make ricotta. Let the cheese drain for 15 min.

8. Break up the curd and mix in 1 tsb. salt.

9. Put cheese in a dry pot over very low flame to heat the glob. Knead the cheese. Fold it onto itself. The cheese will become soft and elastic, forming that deliciously familiar mozzarella ball.

To store, make saline water and store in the fridge. Eat within the week. This stuff goes bad fast. OR, bread mozzarella sticks and eat a pound of cheese in a sitting :)

Freezer Ice Cream

Not quite like Ben and Jerry’s, but still pretty good.

Supplies

• 1 rennet tablet

• ½ cup sugar

• 1-1/2 cup whole milk

1. Dissolve the rennet tablet in ½ cup of water.

2. Put milk and sugar in sauce pan (add vanilla or chocolate if desired). Heat and stir to 110F

3. Mix in dissolved rennet.

4. Quickly remove from heat. Put liquid in a pan and place in the freezer.

5. Freeze until firm. Then break into chunks with a fork, when whip with a mixer.

6. Mix in something exciting, bananas, mangos, go wild. Freeze again.

Whey Ricotta

1. Take the whey from the mozzarella and let it sit at room temperature over night. It still has active ingredients from the mozzarella.

2. In the morning raise temperature to boiling. Stir frequently, do not let it burn or boil over. This takes a while.

3. Remove from heat and let the pot sit until cool.

4. Strain into cloth-colander contraption. Tie up cloth; it could take a bit of time to strain completely. After you can lay the cloth open-face and flat to continue the drying process if you want.

5. Remove from cloth and enjoy.

Butter

Wendy and I purchased a 5L jerry can of milk so we had a bit of leftover milk. If the milk is raw whole milk, the cream will be forming at the top. Remove the cream and shake it vigorously for a while in something like tupperware. Boom, butter. Additionally, the remaining liquid in the Tupperware is buttermilk. Go ahead and craft some of John’s fantastic blister biscuits.

Suggested playlist while making milk product:

1. Milkman of human kindness-Billy Bragg

2. Milk Cow blues –Elvis Presley

3. Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk- Rufus Wainwright

4. Ernie-Benny Hill

5. Milk bottle symphony-Saint Etienne

6. Milkman-Aphex Twin

7. Milk-Garbage

8. No Milk today-Herman’s Hermits

9. Milkshake-Kelis