Cheese, January 29
Our first potluck and workshop of the year was a hit with a great turnout and many new faces! After our break from the holidays, we were all excited to get back to some fun kitchen experimentation.
Hosting a cheesemaking workshop was something that originally seemed like a delicious but tricky and time-consuming endeavour. I've cried over many litres of wasted milk in my own kitchen as I tried to make mozzarella from a 'fool-proof' Cheesemaking kit and saw it become disintegrated milky soup. Luckily, we had Aaron to show us the way, and it turns out that making a basic cheese recipe is a snap! The trick is to start small - an obvious statement, but easy to forget when your cheesemaking kit claims otherwise. If you're a first-time cheesemaker, try ricotta. All you need is a bunch of different kinds of milk and 20 minutes. Then you can dress it up savory or sweet, and voila, you've got homemade cheese!
For the vegans out there who miss this legen-dairy treat (har har), we attempted to make cashew cheese to see if it was a good replacement. The process is also super easy, just throw everything into a blender and adjust to taste. Its appearance and texture more resembled hummus, but it made for a yummy alternative and great dip. To get a cheesy flavor we used nutritional yeast, which is supposed to be a source of protein and vitamins like B12. You can follow our recipe and add more if you want a stronger taste.
Anybody out there have any cheesemaking sucesses or failures they want to share? Don't be shy, share with us below in the comment box!
