fresh cheese

This morning I made a batch of fresh cheese. I didn't think I could do it here...they don't have fresh from the cow milk. Everything I've found before has been canned milk. The last time we went to the grocery store, though, we found whole milk in bags that had to be refrigerated, and then, ummm...there's no closing it back up. And it's a BAG, so you can't even set it inside the fridge without it falling over and dumping milk all over the place. So, yesterday, we opened a bag and made hot chocolate...then we had leftover hot milk...what to do, what to do...

So I poured some vinegar in it and left it to separate. And it did! I was apprehensive, because I'd tried this before with canned milk, but canned milk does not curdle at all. Encouraged by the fact that the milk solids had separated from the whey, I lined my strainer with a paper towel and poured the solids and whey through. Yeay! It's sitting on my counter now, draining. WOOT!! I would have preferred to use lime juice, but I thought I might just be pitching the whole works out, so just dumped in a couple of shots of vinegar instead. I've tasted it already...not bad, not bad...tangy with a bit of vinegar flavor remaining...needs some salt and maybe some herbs after it completes the draining process. It will be soft, because I didn't continue with the scalding of the curds, but for my first attempt here, on the fly and kind of spontaneously done, not bad at all.

I offered Celeste a bit of the whey and she turned her nose up at it. Picky dog.