Cheddar Cheese and More

Been busy making more cheese lately. Cherri-Knoll Greenhouse in PA. is a great source of great milk for making cheese.

I decided to branch out and try cheddar cheese. Got the recipe from http://www.culturesforhealth.com/how-to-make-cheddar-cheese-recipe . I am in the drying stage at the moment.

I used two gallons of milk for this. It made a nice wheel. The hard part is waiting a month or two before trying it. The other problem is I won't know if it turned out ok till then. Making any more at this point wouldn't be a good idea till I know if it turns out. I am still waiting for the provolone I had made. I am getting itchy to try that soon as well. I did make a great wheel of Colby last week.

Pretty isn't it? This I will try soon. Supposedly you don't have to wait for this to age too much. I have it under wraps in my fridge to age just a few weeks.

I am out of mozzarella so with the remaining milk this week I will make more of that. It is my fav to make. I just love the stretching part don't you? You will find that recipe in one of my other blogs. Let me know if you have any questions or comments. They are always welcomed!

Enjoy!
Stephanie

www.webdees.com

Homemade Cleanser

There will be no pictures for this. Who wants to see a dirty bathroom? Well, I went to clean the "water closet" and couldn't find any cleanser! The commercial market has all those fancy cleaner just spray on and wipe off. I am an old fashion type and love my cleanser type of person. Yes, it takes more to rinse off but I just can't get away from it. Sorry, it is what it is. Back to my issue. I am out. Now what. Stare at it and hope it goes away? Wait for another day when I can get to the store to buy more? Heck no. Think. Ok. I have other stuff which none by themselves will work. *light bulb goes off* Off to the kitchen! Yes, the kitchen. Grabbed a bowl and put a generous portion of baking soda, many spritzes of Clorox cleaner (use bleach instead if not available) and a squirt of Dawn dish washing liquid (great for cutting grease). Off to the bathroom. It made the fixtures shine, cut though the gunk, and did a better job than my favorite cleanser with less product! Best part, less scrubbing! Just what I like! And rinsing was minimal!

Sometimes we just have to take a step back and use some of our grey matter. I hope you find this helpful. It worked for me. Using it took half the time that I usually take cleaning the bathroom. I believe it was the NOT need to rinse so much. Please try it and let me know how you made out!

Enjoy!

Stephanie

www.webdees.com

Miss me?

Did you miss me? I have been making the same thing over again and like I have mentioned before I didn't think it was news worthy to repeat. I just wanted to wish everyone a great and safe holiday weekend. I did make some homemade pizza with my homemade mozzarella. Here it is!

I did do something different on the crust though. Instead of water I used buttermilk. You know it came out rather well! Full bodied, crunchy on the outside, tender on the inside. Also made a nice Sicilian type crust. 

I always believe in trying something new! Any questions let me know!

Enjoy

Stephanie

www.webdees.com

Ricotta Cheese Cake with homemade Ricotta

Haven't been posting lately since I have been making the same thing over again and I didn't think anyone would be appreciative seeing the same thing over and over again. Lately I have been making a lot of cheese and of course there is lots of ricotta being made from the whey. I decided to make a ricotta cheesecake! It came out very well if I may say so. Here is what I did.

 

About 2-3 pounds of Ricotta

2/3 cups of sugar

1/3 cup of flour

6 eggs

1/8 salt

2 tsp. of orange zest

2 tsp. orange extract

2 tsp. vanilla extract

Ground or fresh ground nutmeg

Pre-Heat oven 300 degrees.

Beat ricotta smooth, add flour, sugar, salt, extracts, zest. Beat your eggs in one at a time till well incorporated. Butter and flour a spring form pan. Pour in batter in pan. Bake for 1 1/2 hours or until golden and knife comes out clean. Chill before serving. Garnish with orange slices if you want.

As you can see it didn't take long for us to dig in! I suspect they the whole cake won't make the end of the weekend! I am sure you can use store bought ricotta but I love making use of everything so I made my own! It certainly a bonus from making cheese. Any questions let me know!

 

 

Enjoy!

Stephanie

 

www.webdees.com

Cream, Butter and New Bread Recipe and cheese making info

   Morning everyone. Today I skimmed off the cream from my milk. Thought I would give butter a try. Also, trying to come up with another bread recipe of my own. I have the cream sitting and the dough rising at the moment, just waiting till all is ready to proceed with each.

Dough rising

Cream ripening for butter attempt

   Just to re-cap, I get fresh milk from an Amish farm. I was particularly blessed to find this farm. They have a greenhouse with many fabulous plants as well as the milk I can use in my cheese making and such. The ultimate prize is that everything is so reasonably priced! This is certainly a huge bonus for sure.

 

   When you can get milk in this form for less than store bought, you have hidden treasures. Store bought milk has been separated and most of the butterfat has been removed. Hence the 1%. 2% and so on types of milk. I believe they also kill the lipases in the milk which is needed in certain cheese so you have to add it back in. That involves buying it from either +Amazon.com or a place like www.cheesemaking.com . As well, I have found that my yogurt came out better with the fresh milk too. I can't wait to make butter and get REAL, not store bought cultured buttermilk! I use both my homemade yogurt and buttermilk in making cheese because they each contain certain cultures necessary to make certain cheeses. More on that later.

 

   Now don't be mistaken. This is all work in progress and I am certainly not an expert on anything. I enjoy making these things and there are failures. Like making bread at the shore. The dough becomes a living blob dripping over the pans taking over the place and not rising up like it should. I usually let the dough rise in the oven with the light on and it just oozes everywhere! Then it's time to scrap out, toss in the garbage and clean the oven. *Scratching Head* Still trying to figure that one out. It doesn't do that at home and I can't seem to understand why I have so much trouble at the shore. NONE of my breads seem to rise right except at home! It has to be something with the salt air...I will figure it out sooner or later.

 

   So, I will just chug along here and just checked my rising dough. We seem to be rising quite nicely...another living blob thing again?

Will have to wait and see. Trying to make a bread with a nice holey texture for topping with my homemade cheeses and home grown tomatoes. I will keep you posted on my progress....till later!

UPDATE: I have let it rise and kneaded for a few minutes and let it rest..getting ready to divide.

Have the sheet ready sprayed with oil and dusted with corn meal

Kneaded and resting. It had a nice smooth feel to it too.

What shapes shall I make? One big and a few small? Undecided...any suggestions anyone? Well I decided without you! Making one long and a few little rounds.

I have hope. Take a look...I cut the salt in half what I would normally put in.

There is hope! No Blob!

 I had cut down on the salt by half like I said....rising normally. Going for the egg wash and the bake next.

 A little hazy since it is thru the door. The steam is making it hard to take a picture.

Starting to look good. Turned the pan around twice. Doing the final bake stretch.

I think we have a winner! Who wants the recipe?

 

   I have finally made butter! Oh so smooth and creamy! Ever since watching Gene London show way back when I remember he made butter on his show. Took me over 40 years to get around to it but I did it and with real milk cream that I separated! Ok you peeps...who watched that show? Since I didn't have my Kitchen Aid mixer available I used a blender. My cream was sufficiently fermented. The butter rose to the top. I scooped it out into a small bowl and over the blender keep folding it over with a big spoon squeezing out the milk till it formed a small ball. Lightly salt and store in the fridge. This was a perfect partner with my new bread recipe.

The butter floats to the top.

Squeezed the milk out of the butter and made a ball.

I made butter! A little salt will do.

Buttering my bread.

Addendum: Even though I cut the salt down by half I still don't think the dough reached it's potential. I still think some flattening was going on. I did get a great tasting and looking product. When I look at the finished product I see some flattening. Not to be discouraged I think a minimum of salt will correct the issue. I am convinced that the salt air has a lot to do with the finished product not to mention the rising phase. Is there anyone else out there by the sea bake bread? I am so interested in your opinion. Please, please leave comments. Cheers everyone. I am done.....I will be making the recipe next at home. I am sure I will get a good rise there! Who wants it?


Enjoy!

Steph

 

www.webdees.com

Homemade Hamburger Buns or dinner rolls

I made a crock pot full of pulled pork and had no buns to put it on. Since I had all day (made them on a Sunday) I decided to make my own. I had checked out a great book from the local library called "The Bread Baker's Apprentice" by Peter Reinhart. It is an excellent book by the way. This recipe makes two 1 pound loaves, 18 dinner rolls, or 12 burger or hot dog buns. I did make a variation of the recipe since I didn't have "bread" flour and only unbleached flour. I added Hodgson Mill Vital Gluten to the mix to make up for the lack of bread flour. Also, instead of water I used some of my whey from making cheese but water is fine. Here is the recipe:

 

4 3/4 cups of unbleached bread flour or unbleached flour w/4 tbls. of Hodgson mill vital wheat gluten

1 1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/4 cup of powdered milk (DMS)

3 1/4 tablespoons of sugar

2 teaspoons of instant yeast

1 large egg slightly beaten at room temp

3 1/4 tablespoons of butter, margarine or shortening, melted or at room temp

1 1/2 plus 1 tablespoon to 1 3/4 cup Water (or whey from cheese making) at room temp

1 egg whisked with 1 tsp. of water until frothy for egg wash (optional)

Sesame or poppy seeds for garnish (optional)

 

Mix together the flour, salt, powdered milk, sugar, and yeast in a large bowl or bowl of mixer. Pour in the egg, butter and 1 1/2 cups plus water or whey and mix (mix on low on electric mixer with paddle attachment) until all the flour is absorbed and the dough forms a ball. if the dough seems very stiff and dry, trickle in more water or whey until dough is soft and supple. Sprinkle flour on counter and transfer dough. Knead adding more flour if needed to create a dough that is soft and tacky but not sticky. Knead for about 6-8 minutes. Lightly oil a large bowl and transfer the dough to the bowl, rolling it to coat it with oil. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for about 2 hours or until the dough doubles in size. At that time turn out on your counter again and divide into two for loaves, 18 for dinner rolls or 12 for hamburger or hot dog rolls. Line sheets for the oven with parchment paper and shape your dough. Spritz with some oil and cover with towel to let rise about 60 - 90 minutes till dough doubles in size. I am making burger rolls.

Pre-heat your oven for 350 degrees for loaves and 400 for rolls. At this point you can use your egg wash and/or optional sesame/poppy seeds. Bake for 15 min. for the rolls or 35-45 min for loaves.

Cool for about an hour before using.

They came out soft and fluffy! I used them for my pulled pork sandwich

Any questions let me know! good luck!

 

Enjoy!

Stephanie

 

www.webdees.com

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The Amish Farm and Greenhouse Cherri-Knoll in PA.

If we all could be so lucky as to live near the Amish. They are more dear to my heart. Along with my friends that have goats whom I have gotten goat's milk from for some awesome Feta cheese that I have made I have recently frequented this place. To all my readers who live in the tri-state area of DE, PA, and MD. you really need to check this place out. Located not far from the Herr's Potato chip factory, it is a great place for cacti and other plants including milk and honey! I haven't sampled the honey but the milk is great for my cheese making and they have fresh eggs galore! Other than raising your own stuff this is the best to get it. Marketed lower than store bought, you can not go wrong. Also the variety of plants and such are great! I recently purchase a Echeveria Cactus, and a citronella plant from there at a very reasonable price.

 

Here is their brochure. The lady that runs the greenhouse likes to refer to herself as Cherri-knoll. If you should stop by please let her know you found her here and mention my name. Here is their brochure! Tell her I sent you!

 

 

Enjoy!

Stephanie

www.webdees.com