Farmer's Cheese | Recipeish | Gustus Vitae

by Frankie Scanlon
  • Yield: 2 blocks of fresh cheese.
  • Time Estimate: 45 minutes.
  • Storage Notes: Will keep for up 5 days covered and refrigerated.
  • Difficulty: Medium.

This a really great, straightforward intro to making your own cheese. With just a bit of time and ingredients you probably already have, you'll have fresh homemade cheese with flavors that are infinitely customizable. Here's a recipe for a couple of our favorites.

Ingredients

  • 1 gallon whole milk. Unpasteurized is best, pasteurized is fine, and ultra-pasteurized is no good.
  • 1/2 cup white vinegar.
  • 1 tin Taste of Morocco Seasoning.
  • 1 tin Herbs de Everything Seasoning.
  • 1 tin Probiotic Ocean Salt.
  • Not an ingredient, but you'll need cheesecloth for this. Most natural grocers carry this, or you can get more than you'll ever need for like 10 bucks on Amazon.
Directions
  • Pour a half gallon of milk in a heavy bottomed pot - a dutch oven is ideal if you have one.
  • Slowly bring up to to temp at medium low. Don't rush it, or you'll scorch the bottom and burn some of the milk.
  • When small bubbles begin to form, and before it hits a full boil, remove from heat. We just eyeball it, but if you're going for precision, the sweet spot for temperature is 185-190F.
  • Pour in vinegar. You'll see the liquid immediately begin to separate. This is good.
  • Ever so carefully, gently stir the mixture. Allow to rest for 5 minutes.
  • Prepare a colander with cheese cloth over a bowl below to catch the whey.
  • Using a slotted spoon or fine mesh spider, ladle out the curds on the cheese cloth.
  • Sprinkle on 2 tbs each of Probiotic Ocean Salt and Herbs de Everything Seasoning, and mix to combine.
  • Wrap cheese cloth to fully encompass curds, and push down to squeeze out as much moisture as you can. Then, using a heavy object (a cast iron pan is perfect here), compress for 5 minutes to get out any remaining moisture.
  • This is the time to mold these cheese - you can leave it rough, or compress into any form you'd like. We use the top half of a butter container - press in firmly, flip to remove, cover in saran, and refrigerate.
  • Strain remaining whey though cheese cloth. This reserved whey is an excellent source of protein, and has a slightly sweet taste - we love using it as opposed to stock when making risottos.
  • Rinse cheese cloth, and repeat, this time swapping Herbs de Everything for Taste of Morocco.
  • Congrats - you've made cheese!
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