Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Cheesepalooza - August Challenge


Well, that says it all, doesn't it? ;)



For Cheesepalooza we're using Mary Karlin's book, Artisan Cheese Making At Home.

I used her Whole Milk Ricotta recipe, but instead of using Citric Acid I used lemon juice.
2L milk, 1 cup cream, 1/4 cup lemon juice.
The lemon juice was added AFTER the milk was brought to temperature.

That is important to note as the citric acid is added before the milk is heated.



Here is my milk and cream slowly coming to temperature.


I heated mine VERY slowly, it took close to 40min before it was ready to add the lemon juice.

Now, usually when I make cheese I use the freshest ingredients I can find.
Which usually means fresh lemons and Vital Greens milk and cream.

Not this time. Why?
Budget and time.
The best that I could find isn't what I could afford this month.
And I'm out at my parent's acreage for a bit working in the garden, so I'm using what I have at my disposal.




Does that mean the cheese I make isn't going to taste good?


Of course not!
In fact, it's quite tasty! A little lemony, but very good - fluffy and rich (I used extra cream).



But as much as we all try to eat the best foods we can, sometimes it just doesn't work out that way. Don't worry about it too much. Really :)




One of the greatest things about fresh cheeses is that you can enjoy them right away.
When my mom came home from work it was finished draining and immediately spread on it on some crackers :)

She didn't care that it wasn't farm fresh milk (she grew up on raw milk, by the way).  In fact, most of the milk you find in big box stores in from Alberta.  There are a lot of dairies here. 


So, for a cheese that is little more than milk and lemon juice, it is both light and rich; fresh and tangy and all around delicious.

Save your fresh milk for the cultured and aged cheeses.  Ýou'll be sure to notice a difference in quality for those :)







Tasting Notes:
Appearance: White, lightly textured
Nose (aroma): slightly lemony
Overall Taste: rich (due to extra cream), slightly lemony
Sweet to Salty: neutral to slightly acidic
Mild (mellow) to Robust to Pungent (stinky): mellow
Mouth Feel: (gritty, sandy, chewy, greasy, gummy, etc.): smooth but slightly textured

And if you're wondering what was so important I had to make a trip out to the farm for....

They needed to be picked over the weekend (or last week) but I didn't have the time then.
Can you guess how many different kinds there are?

Don't forget to leave comments and let me know how your cheese making goes!  Be sure to include a link to your site :)

Happy Cheese Making!

11 comments:

  1. Lovely post, especially the comment about fresh (good) milk for aged cheeses.... so true. Are there 6 types of beans there? Nice!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You're close! I would put the number but I want to know if anyone will guess it :)

      Delete
  2. deb-
    i liked your comment - dont worry about it - REALLY ha ha ha....my life's motto for sure!

    i count 8 dif types of beans...they all look delicious....fresh beans are totally my fav...'our' little garden box has lots of bean plants but no beans???? not sure what happened there - i think i have nibblers that are eating my stuff - not sure if they are 2 or 4 legged!

    have fun - thanks for the posts

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 2 types of yellow, 1 purple and 4 green.
      Your beans should bloom soon, they were planted later than these ones :)

      Delete
  3. Absolutely GORGEOUS cheese!!!!!
    Can't wait to see what you do with it.
    Would love to see your Tasting Notes so I can compare them with mine!
    :)
    V

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I forgot what the categories were lol
      I saw them on your site so I'll do an update here :)

      Delete
  4. I loved making the fresh ricotta (post will be up tomorrow.. ;) although I did use raw milk. I happen to find it and figured why not try it out as it something you don't find here very often. I can't wait to see what next month will bring.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Raw milk is illegal to buy here in Canada, unfortunately. There are some ppl working to change that, but change is often a hard and long process...
      Look forward to your post!

      Delete
  5. I love your post! I just joined the Cheesepalooza challenge today, and I am SO excited! Your cheese looks great - I can't wait to make mine! :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Wow look at all those beans!

    I want to try making the ricotta with lemon at some point because I imagine that a tiny hint of lemon flavor is pretty tasty. Yours looks wonderful :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. I do need to try the lemon juice ricotta at some point too... I managed to have success with Mary's citric acid ricotta. For now, if it isn't broken... hahah. Looks great though! I'm excited for this year of cheese and hope to make it to Edmonton for a tasting party at some point!

    ReplyDelete