How To Make Cheese
When people ask me to explain how to make cheese, I always reassure them that it is not a difficult task at all. Soft cheese is really easy to make, and with a bit of practice you can master the creation of hard cheese as well. For complete instructions on how to make cheese and dozens of cheese recipes, I recommend this very popular book.
If you want to know how to make cheese, you need to understand its core process. Making hard cheese is a four part symphony:
- Introducing friendly bacteria to the milk in order to acidify it
- Separation of the curds (milk’s solids) from the whey (its liquid)
- Pressing the cheese
- Aging the cheese
You start by adding a “starter” to the milk, like buttermilk. The starter turns the milk sugar into lactic acid, which helps to separate the curds from the whey. Afterwards you add “rennet” to the milk. Rennet contains an enzyme that catalyzes the coagulation of milk. Now is the most demanding part of learning how to make cheese, because you need patience. You have to wait until the milk turns into a sort of gel. This is called a “clean break”.
Full separation of the curds from the whey is done by cutting the gelled milk, heating it up and draining the whey through a strainer. Unfortunately, some newbies, still learning how to make cheese, forget to add salt at this stage. This is a mistake since it is required for the final stage of curing and aging. You first press the cheese (for at least half a day), then dry it (which can take up to 2 weeks) and age it for at least a month.
Everytime I learn a new thing or try a new recipe from this great book on how to make cheese, I am still amazed how delicious and tempting cheese can be. I hope you will be amazed too.
