Mozzarella and Ricotta Cheeses

This looks like pizza dough, but it's homemade mozzarella cheese.

As a kid, I was obsessed with craft-making kits. As a grown-up, I have the same feeling about cheese-making kits. And so my darling husband got me these for my birthday. He did this because he is thoughtful and knows me well, and also because I sent him the Amazon links a few weeks ago.

I should have worn a crown like the girl on the box.

And so I spent a fair portion of my 33rd birthday concocting mozzarella and ricotta cheese in the kitchen. (I'll save the goat cheese kit for another day. There's only so much cheese we can eat around here.)

I won't outline all of the instructions here, because they're long, and there are plenty of good guides on the internet. But, I will summarize as follows:

1) Homemade cheese is delicious.

2) It's extremely satisfying to turn a gallon of milk into something as cool as mozzarella or ricotta cheese.

3) Ricotta cheese is ridiculously easy to make.

4) Mozzarella cheese involves more steps, but it certainly isn't difficult.

5) By my calculation, fresh mozzarella and goat cheese are significantly cheaper to make than to buy. Ricotta cheese is only slightly cheaper, but it's so easy that it's still worth it.

6) Before making cheese, decide what you're going to do with the end product. Otherwise, you might eat way more fresh mozzarella than a person should eat.

This ricotta cheese is now in the freezer awaiting future use.

Fresh mozzarella marinating in olive oil, garlic, and garden-grown parsley... seriously.

The Verdict:

Overall grade: A

Overall reason: That moment when the mozzarella curds start behaving like cheese... magic.

Time to prepare: Ask me again when I'm not pausing to read instructions after every step. But it's pretty fast, as evidenced by the husband quote...

Husband quote: Woah, it's done already?

Comments

Kitchen renovation!

BEFORE: AFTER: Still to come: a beautiful new induction range and some wood shelving on the left side, above the backsplash. And maybe the shelving unit on the wall facing the cabinets should be green, but we're going to live with a while before making that decision.

Curry Fried Rice

Excited for these leftovers. One of the things I wanted to try with my new jar of curry powder was fried rice. Years ago, Miles got fried rice at Korea House and it was the best fried rice I'd ever had. I suspected there was curry powder in it, but at that time I had never really cooked with curry powder, so I tucked that knowledge away for a later date. After reading a few recipes, I went rogue on this one. I couldn't even begin to effectively guess at what proportions I ended up with, so the recipe below is more of a rough guideline of ingredients. The "Recipe" (sorry no quantities; follow your heart): leftover jasmine rice tofu, cubed and crisped in the oven with avocado oil and salt vegetables: garlic, onion, cabbage, red bell pepper salt curry powder (I used a Vietnamese one) soy sauce sugar sesame oil future topping ideas: runny egg, sesame seeds, green onion Saute the vegetables in avocado oil until softened, and salt them to taste Add the tofu and toss to...

Samosa Burritos

Imagine a pile of plain yogurt and some Indian pickle for dipping I saw a Pinterest recipe for samosa-filled quesadillas, which led me to this recipe from Nadia's Healthy Kitchen for baked samosas using tortillas, which led me to just use the giant tortillas I had in the fridge and make them into full-sized burritos. They were a hit! I largely followed the recipe from Nadia's Healthy Kitchen, but I added some potato, omitted the chana masala powder and just added a bunch of cumin instead, added bell pepper and fresh chilies, didn't bother with the "sealing paste," and basted them in a little bit of melted butter (omit for vegan version). Everyone except the 5-year-old liked them! The Recipe (adapted from Nadia's Healthy Kitchen ) 2 cans (30 oz total) cooked garbanzo beans, rinsed (I eyeballed the equivalent from dry beans) 1 small onion, chopped 4 garlic cloves, minced 1 thai chili, minced 1 bell pepper, chopped 1 potato, baked until soft (or microwaved for...

Adventures of a healthy-ish pseudo-foodie

Search This Blog