Homemade Cream Cheese / Soft Cheese Recipe
Recipe Description:
A super easy, versatile and tasty cheese -- use in salad dressings or dips, in place of cream cheese, or spread on toast.
Recipe
Instructions:
Put the milk in a half gallon or gallon size jar. Sprinkle the mesophilic culture on it and stir in with a wooden spoon.
Put the 1/4 cup of water in a little jar or cup. Add one drop of the double-strength liquid rennet. Stir well. Take one tablespoon of this solution and add it to the jar of milk. Stir well. (If using regular strength liquid rennet, mix one drop of it with the water, but add 2 tablespoons of the solution to the milk and stir well.) This solution will keep in the refrigerator for one or two weeks. If it smells disagreeable, toss it. (It will smell like nothing when it is still good.)
Cover the jar of milk with a cloth napkin and secure with a rubber band. Let sit out at room temperature to culture for 24 hours.
Place the colander inside a pot or bowl. Make sure it is big enough to catch up to a quart of the whey that will drip out. Layer two pieces of 90 thread count cheesecloth in the colander.
The milk should now be thick and gelled, much like a firm yogurt. Transfer these curds into the cheesecloth. It is okay if they fall apart. Do it gently, but don’t be concerned about keeping them all in one piece.
Tie up the opposite corners of the cheesecloth, making a bag to enclose the curds. Lay the ends of the cheesecloth on top of the bundle of curds in the colander. Don’t let the ends of the cheesecloth hang out of the colander, or the whey will drip down into a puddle on your counter.
Leave this setup out at room temperature for 24 hours, during which time the whey will drip out and the curds will thicken. You can do this in the refrigerator if you prefer a less sour cheese.
Untie the cheesecloth and check the consistency of the cheese. Let it hang longer if you wish the cheese to thicken more. At this point, it is usually spreadable and soft, thicker than mayonnaise but not dry.
Transfer the cheese to a clean bowl.
Optional: Add 1/2 teaspoon of sea salt. Stir. Adjust amount of salt to taste. Refrigerate.
Save and refrigerate the whey that drips out; it may be used in lacto-ferments.
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