Wednesdays at our house are typically vegan, so it's a painful day to make such delights but very needed as we had 4+ gallons of milk in one of our extra fridges.
I hadn't been planing on making them, but after a root canal re-do, I felt like it...go figure. I took 2 containers of lentil soup and one "mystery" soup out of the freezer and put them out to thaw. There was dinner for later. Time to make the cheese.
Farmers Goat Cheese aka Chevre
2 gallons of milk into a pot, very full, bring up to a boil or just under (when frothy). Remove from heat.
1/2 c. white vinegar, mix in slowly to hot milk so it's very well combined, will separate, let sit about 10 min.
Prepare a colander with a cheese cloth/thin dish towel liner. I prefer to put a bucket or pot underneath and collect the whey, our chickens love it.
Pour curds and whey into cloth.
Add kosher or sea salt, I used about 2 Tbs today, taste it to see. Let the curds drain for a bit. The cheese absorbs the saltiness so it typically needs more than you may feel comfortable putting it. Taste again to be sure you don't need more before you hang it.
At this point we put them into our little homemade cheese press and press it in the fridge overnight with a couple boxes of soda pop.
This makes a nice firm cheese, not super dry, just holds together nicely. We cut it into quarters and vacuum seal it then put in fridge, it keeps a long time in the vacuum seal. Otherwise you can freeze it. It's nice to slice and put on crackers this way.
Instead of pressing the cheese you can simply tie the cheese inside the cloth and drain it for a few hours and then eat, or overnight in the fridge. Once I just put it into a round Tupperware container and used it as a spread for crackers the next day, then added smoked salmon. Heavenly. You can make this recipe as big or small as you like, just keep proportions mostly the same with the vinegar to milk.
This is my fastest easiest method to use up extra milk. Our favorite cheese recipe are the squeaky cheese curds, but that takes 3-4 times as long to make. I like the non-goatiness of this particular cheese, people at church love it as well, it is very very mild. It also will not melt, you can fry up squares of it in a pan for Indian dishes that call for paneer. It's basically the same recipe.
Goat Milk Chocolate Custard Ice Cream
I combined Rachael Ray's technique (mix all in a blender) with the Ben and Jerry recipe, then added in my own need to use up a ton of goats milk, and this is what I made:
Their recipe, like most icecream recipes, called for 1 1/2 c. milk and 1 c. cream, but separating goats milk is such a pain in the, so I decided to condense my own milk and try that and replace the milk and cream.
I made 4 batches of the custard because we had so much. It will keep nicely in the fridge until I'm ready to turn it into ice cream.
Prepare condensed milk (a couple of hours letting the milk evaporate on the stove using a heavy bottom pot, stirring often 'cause the darn skin keeps forming), I took about 8 c. milk and it made about 6 1/2 c. condensed milk.
2 eggs in blender, blend for a minute or so.
1 c. sugar and 1/3 c. cocoa powder mixed, pour in about 1/2 and blend
1/3 c. chocolate chips, I only had semi-sweet, blend
1 1/2 c. hot condensed milk, pour in a bit of a time to blend as to not hard cook the eggs but to melt the chips
1 tsp vanilla
pinch salt
add any sugar and cocoa powder you still have out.
fill the blender up to the 4 cup line with regular milk...about 1/2 or 3/4 cups.
Pour into cups or into a qt jar to use later in the ice cream maker. Chill for a couple hours. Then use in your icecream maker, follow the instructions on your machine.
I hadn't been planing on making them, but after a root canal re-do, I felt like it...go figure. I took 2 containers of lentil soup and one "mystery" soup out of the freezer and put them out to thaw. There was dinner for later. Time to make the cheese.
Farmers Goat Cheese aka Chevre
2 gallons of milk into a pot, very full, bring up to a boil or just under (when frothy). Remove from heat.
1/2 c. white vinegar, mix in slowly to hot milk so it's very well combined, will separate, let sit about 10 min.
Prepare a colander with a cheese cloth/thin dish towel liner. I prefer to put a bucket or pot underneath and collect the whey, our chickens love it.
Pour curds and whey into cloth.
Add kosher or sea salt, I used about 2 Tbs today, taste it to see. Let the curds drain for a bit. The cheese absorbs the saltiness so it typically needs more than you may feel comfortable putting it. Taste again to be sure you don't need more before you hang it.
At this point we put them into our little homemade cheese press and press it in the fridge overnight with a couple boxes of soda pop.
This makes a nice firm cheese, not super dry, just holds together nicely. We cut it into quarters and vacuum seal it then put in fridge, it keeps a long time in the vacuum seal. Otherwise you can freeze it. It's nice to slice and put on crackers this way.
Instead of pressing the cheese you can simply tie the cheese inside the cloth and drain it for a few hours and then eat, or overnight in the fridge. Once I just put it into a round Tupperware container and used it as a spread for crackers the next day, then added smoked salmon. Heavenly. You can make this recipe as big or small as you like, just keep proportions mostly the same with the vinegar to milk.
This is my fastest easiest method to use up extra milk. Our favorite cheese recipe are the squeaky cheese curds, but that takes 3-4 times as long to make. I like the non-goatiness of this particular cheese, people at church love it as well, it is very very mild. It also will not melt, you can fry up squares of it in a pan for Indian dishes that call for paneer. It's basically the same recipe.
Goat Milk Chocolate Custard Ice Cream
I combined Rachael Ray's technique (mix all in a blender) with the Ben and Jerry recipe, then added in my own need to use up a ton of goats milk, and this is what I made:
Their recipe, like most icecream recipes, called for 1 1/2 c. milk and 1 c. cream, but separating goats milk is such a pain in the, so I decided to condense my own milk and try that and replace the milk and cream.
I made 4 batches of the custard because we had so much. It will keep nicely in the fridge until I'm ready to turn it into ice cream.
Prepare condensed milk (a couple of hours letting the milk evaporate on the stove using a heavy bottom pot, stirring often 'cause the darn skin keeps forming), I took about 8 c. milk and it made about 6 1/2 c. condensed milk.
2 eggs in blender, blend for a minute or so.
1 c. sugar and 1/3 c. cocoa powder mixed, pour in about 1/2 and blend
1/3 c. chocolate chips, I only had semi-sweet, blend
1 1/2 c. hot condensed milk, pour in a bit of a time to blend as to not hard cook the eggs but to melt the chips
1 tsp vanilla
pinch salt
add any sugar and cocoa powder you still have out.
fill the blender up to the 4 cup line with regular milk...about 1/2 or 3/4 cups.
Pour into cups or into a qt jar to use later in the ice cream maker. Chill for a couple hours. Then use in your icecream maker, follow the instructions on your machine.
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| Beautiful pic of some paneer with herbs added along with the salt. (not mine) |
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