Cheesemaking: Reinventing Muslin And Crochet Thread

It has been a goal of mine in the last few years to begin incorporating more vegetarian meals into our diet. The cost of meat is high and I have been convinced that dried beans are the wonder food because of their price and health content. For my birthday I received "How to Cook Everything Vegetarian" by Mark Bittman.

For dinner one rainy day the boys and I decided to make cheese.

What you need:

1/2 gallon milk
Quart buttermilk
Salt to taste
Washed muslin from your stash (or you could do it the real way and use cheesecloth)
Crochet thread (or yarn or any type of string)
Collander
Stirring spoon
Pot
Little hands to help you stir and squeeze

1. Place your collander in the sink. I put mine in a bowl to catch the whey.

2. Put your muslin cloth over the strainer.

3. Bring the milk and salt to a boil.

4. Pour in the buttermilk all at once.

5. Stir the mixture.

6. The milk will begin to separate into cheese and whey.

7. Pour the whole thing on top of your cloth in the strainer. It will look like dry cottage cheese. In fact, it is dry cottage cheese and you can eat it this way.

8. Pull up the corners of the cloth and twist it to form a ball. Run it under water and start to twist the liquid out. When it is cool enough to handle the kids can help squeeze the rest of the whey out.

9. Now tie your string around the top of the ball and let it hang from a spoon over a bowl or your collander. This will set and cool the cheese.

10. When it is cooled off simply unwrap your creation and serve it with your favorite soup and crackers. It is truly delicious.

Along with the book I also received the most adorable cupcake pan from Nordic Ware. We used it to make cornbread.

The kids loved driving their cornbread cars around the clean table and the cheese was delicious. It was a fun way to learn how our commercial food is made and was a perfect activity for a rainy day.