Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Cheesepalooza November Challenge: Mozzarella!

Ah, mozzarella.  The first cheese I learned to make.

A Traditional Mozzarella


I did two different recipes - a Traditional Mozzarella and a 30min Mozzarella.

The 30min version I had made before. Here's a tale of my woes and eventual success...
I like it because the ingredients are easy to obtain and it's an instant gratification (you get to eat it right away :) ).

30min Mozza


This time when I made it I had a bit of an odd experience.  A tiny bit of the milk curdled when I first added the citric acid.
And that tiny bit floated at the top the entire time, even after the curd had set (and sunk to the bottom of the pot) so I skimmed it off before heating and stretching the curd.

This curd also shattered a bit, but I was able to save it. Cuz I'm AWESOME like that ;)






The traditional mozzarella was quite time intensive and required an expensive piece of equipment... a digital pH meter!  Which I bought by convincing myself that it would be used for cheese, canning and dry-cured sausage making :)

Unfortunately I either had too much rennet or over heated my milk (or both) and the curd was "squeaky".
It still heated and stretched beautifully and melted/stretched afterwards.  I definitely want to make this one again with better milk.

Both cheese were eaten straight :)


Tasting Notes
Appearance: White and smooth
Nose (aroma): none
Overall Taste: Good. Nice salt. The traditional had a more acidic note to it's flavour.
Sweet to Salty: Pleasantly salty (from brine on traditional and kneading in salt on 30min)
Mild (mellow) to Robust to Pungent (stinky): Mellow
Mouth Feel: (gritty, sandy, chewy, greasy, gummy, etc.): Chewy to Squeaky


Happy Cheese Making!
Let me know how you used your mozza :)


7 comments:

  1. Looks fab! Where do you get rennet and citric acid? You have inspired me to try! It myself!

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    1. Citric acid is sold by the spices and canning supplies in most groc stores. May even be able to find some in pharmacies (it is just concentrated Vit.C)
      Italian centre (south and north) should both have rennet tablets. And someone once told me Bosch Kitchen Centre has liquid rennet.

      I ordered both from cheesemaking.com when I picked up a bunch of other speciality supplies (molds, cultures, etc).
      However, there are more stores popping up in Alberta now that you can order those from too now! I'll be doing my next bulk order from Danlac or Glengarry.

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  2. That looks so awesome! Thanks for having such an inspiring blog!!!

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  3. I can't wait for this weekend to go into a mass cheesemaking frenzy! WOoooo HOOOOoooo!

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  4. Maybe I need to come by your place this time for a Mozzarella lesson. I guess I will just have to keep at it. Your traditional looks great. Bulk barn also sells citric acid too.

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  5. Wow, I'm so impressed that you made the traditional recipe! Huge time commitment, also jealous of your pH meter :) Looks great, did you like the final product more than the 30 minute version?

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  6. I do love making things from scratch and I am going to try mozzarella one day. Thanks for the post.

    The Old Fat Guy

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