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How to make homemade cheese?
The main task in the manufacture of cheese is to coagulate, to influence the protein contained in milk in a special way and thereby change its structure. In principle, protein can be affected with any acid - even vinegar, even citric acid. You can use the acid that some microorganisms produce from the sugars contained in milk. But as a result of such an impact, we will get a product that very little resembles the varieties of cheese we know.
The best way to influence milk is with rennet, which is obtained from a special section of the stomach of calves and lambs. In former times, this part of the stomach was prepared in a special way and as a result, the necessary leaven was obtained. Today, it is easier to use ready-made sourdough, which is industrially produced for amateur or artisanal cheese making. For example, I have been using the Japanese Meito sourdough for several years now, which is quite possible to find and purchase, especially for those who have the Internet. Everything else you need to make cheese, I believe, you already have at home.
It is better to take whole milk, although you can also use it bought in a store, because businessmen get cheese even from powdered milk diluted in water. In addition to whole, unpasteurized, but tested milk, you will need a saucepan, oppression, a convenient colander, gauze, etc.
I have already spoken more than once about a very useful item - a rice cooker. Look, firstly, it can be used as a regular, but spacious enough thermos. Secondly, the rice cooker has two heating modes. In one mode, powerful heaters are used and the contents heat up very quickly, when a certain temperature is reached, uniform boiling is maintained over the entire area. From this mode, the rice cooker automatically switches to the second mode when the temperature of the bottom of the pot reaches 125C. In the second mode, the power of the heating elements is about ten times lower, but due to the design of the rice cooker, the heating resembles a water bath, the thermostat of this mode is set to 83-85C.
Therefore, I use a rice cooker when I need a water bath, when I need a large thermos and when something needs to be heated either quickly or vice versa slowly. And such tasks in the kitchen are quite common, believe me. For example, when making homemade cheese, a rice cooker turns out to be my indispensable assistant.
And I also spoke about the special grid that you can see in the photo. With such a network, it is convenient to cook, for example, folding pilaf. They lowered the net into the pan, straightened it, lower the rice into the water. When needed, the rice was lifted out of the water and no colander is needed. So for making cheese, this mesh turned out to be very convenient, although it is quite possible to get by with a colander and even ordinary gauze.
Many people prefer to pasteurize milk before making cheese. However, it must be understood that milk protein changes properties during heating, and the best cheese is obtained from unpasteurized milk. Therefore, you yourself must decide how you will act, because you have read the first two paragraphs of this text.
Sometimes the milk is salted before being made into cheese. Often, milk is prepared for making cheese - sour-milk starter cultures are added to it and they are allowed to work in order to give the raw material a characteristic sour-milk flavor and partly already affect the milk protein. But you can also make cheese from ordinary, unripened milk. In any case, the milk should be very carefully heated to a temperature of 35°C. If you do not have a rice cooker or other similar device, then it is better to do this in a water bath, or you need to put the pan through the divider on the lowest heat and stir often. It's more troublesome, but not difficult.
The first difficulty is related to the fact that 1 gram of sourdough is intended for making cheese from 100 liters of milk. And from five liters of milk you get even more than a kilogram of homemade cheese. Do you need more?
Therefore, the required amount of powder must be separated from the sourdough. Do you have accurate pharmaceutical scales? I don't have either. Therefore, you have to divide the bag into two equal parts, these two into two more, etc., but in the end it still turns out that the starter is measured almost “by eye”. And this negligible amount will have to be evenly distributed throughout the pan. The easiest way is to dilute the starter in a cup of warm water and add it to the milk, after which the milk is thoroughly mixed. The heat must be turned off, and the rice cooker closed and left alone until a clot forms. If you are cooking without using a rice cooker or thermos, wrap the pot in a suitable blanket.