Day 23 of 365

This is ambitious. That was my thought as I looked through the directions to make cheese from the delicious milk I got the other day. I am not even going to pretend that I milked that goat long enough to get all of this but I tried and that was the goal. I'm not planning to become a goat farmer but after the fun I had today I will continue to make this delicious cheese as long as I can. Before doing anything with the milk I had to strain it. I ran it through cheesecloth the other day before storing it in the fridge. I cooked the milk after adding a teaspoon of salt. It took a little time to bring the milk up to temperature and not burn it.

It was an exercise in patience.

Once the liquid hit 185 degrees it was time to add the curdling ingredient. I used apple cider vinegar. I like the flavor and after reading up and talking to the family who helped me with the milk, I decided not to use plain white vinegar. It was the perfect choice. The moment the vinegar hit the milk it started to curdle up and thicken. I didn't want to stir it too much but I really wanted the cheese! I waited and watched the curds separate from the whey. It's actually pretty interesting. After about five minutes there was a thickness at the bottom of the pan and yellow tinted whey floating on top. As it cools I need to separate the curds from the whey. The directions suggest using cheesecloth. Well hello, obviously. So I open the cabinet but there is no cheesecloth it's gone and nowhere to be found. PLAN B! I have to use a sieve, well two actually. This is where shit gets messy. Remember in science class when you talked about volume and all that crap? Yea, I didn't either and there might have been a tiny spill. I'm not really upset because it was mostly whey and the curds sloshed into the smaller sieve. According to the directions the drier you want the cheese the longer you should let the mixture drain. Cheesecloth would have been great right about now. Nope, still couldn't find it. The sieve managed to remove enough to make a pretty tight clump of cheese. The only thing left to do is taste it. I took a sip of the whey and it's mostly just salty liquid. I was told it's great to use if you are baking bread. I might give it a try. I took a tiny taste of the cheese and it was A-Mazing! The entire adventure took about an hour and it's so easy that I would do this again. So delicious.