Making cheese at home: choosing ingredients and kitchen utensils

I have long been interested in how to make cheese at home. But as it turned out, to make real hard cheese you need special starters and bacteria, and such cheese ripens for quite a long time, and during ripening it is necessary to maintain optimal temperature and humidity.

But I did not despair in trying to find a suitable recipe - after all, they used to make homemade cheeses in the villages. Surely without starter cultures and complex technologies.

And so I found a recipe on how to make hard cheese at home. Why was I looking for a recipe for hard cheese? I want it to be able to be cut thinly enough, grated and used on pizza and hot sandwiches - that is, the cheese should also melt well.

Hard cheese at home from milk “Milk Rivers”

Making hard cheese at home does not require a huge amount of effort. To make excellent homemade hard cheese from cottage cheese, you will need only a liter of milk and 150 g of kefir. Find a proven homemade one, store-bought will not work if it says on the packaging that it can be stored for a couple of years - three years, the permissible maximum is a few days. Look for kefir too, as high quality as possible, a low grade will ruin the aftertaste of the cheese. You will need approximately 150 ml. Here are all the ingredients to make homemade hard cheese.

Cooking, following the recipe step by step:

1. Place the milk in a saucepan with a large bottom.
2. When the foam cap subsides and the milk begins to bubble, carefully, trying not to splash, pour in kefir in a thin stream.
3. We are observing a magical process. The cottage cheese separates from the whey and floats to the surface of the saucepan.
4. We throw it onto a clean gauze, or maybe onto another similar fabric. As a matter of fact, the most delicate cottage cheese is already ready and begs to be eaten. But you can't give in to temptation. Let's continue cooking.
5. Tie the gauze tightly with the curd and place it under a press. Real abs don't always live in the modern kitchen. This is not a problem, because you can easily replace it with a large pot of water, or with a tied brick, in general, something heavier.
6. Let the dish sit overnight so that the cottage cheese particles become friends and combine into cheese.
7. We cut into slices and only have time to collect bouquets of praise.

All hard cheeses have a beneficial effect on the digestive system and are recommended for those who want to lose weight properly. The remaining whey is perfect as a base for baking or a dressing for okroshka.

Cooking options

Since we prepare homemade cheese, each housewife’s cooking options may vary significantly.

• you can mix cold milk with cottage cheese and heat and boil immediately together
• beat the eggs, add salt, add sugar to the cheese mass, put on fire and stir while heating the mass
• if you don’t have suitable thick-bottomed dishes, you can cook in a water bath
• you don't need to use eggs
• you don't have to use butter
• The fat content of the finished cheese depends on the amount of butter

Experiment - adjust the recipe to suit yourself - it is quite flexible.

Hard cheese at home from cottage cheese “Sugrob”

If you are planning to make hard cheese at home from cottage cheese, here is a step-by-step preparation diagram. Its taste will bring back memories of childhood in the village, fresh milk and grandmother. Take a liter of milk, preferably cow's milk, a kilo of cottage cheese and a couple of chicken eggs. Another 100 gr. butter, a teaspoon of soda and salt.

Recipe step by step:

1. Place the cottage cheese in a convenient saucepan, pour milk into it, put it on the stove, cook, stirring constantly.
2. If you see that the whey has separated, immediately remove the curd into a colander, or better yet, onto a piece of gauze, press it thoroughly. You don't need extra whey.
3. As soon as you achieve the desired consistency, return the cottage cheese to the saucepan, seasoning it with butter. Don't forget about eggs, salt and soda. Them - there too. If you are a gourmet, you can add a mixture of spices, paprika or dried herbs to the cheese.
4. Cook over heat until the contents become a viscous paste without lumps.
5. Cook for a short time, about 10 minutes. If you overcook it, it will turn out not just hard, but super hard.
6. Place in the refrigerator until completely frozen. You need to take a convenient container, since you will have to cut the cheese right inside it.

Here is a simple recipe for homemade hard cheese. Making hard cheese at home will protect you from low-quality palm oil products.

Subtleties of making homemade hard cheese

How to make cheese at home? A question that interests many housewives and novice cheese makers who want to prepare a delicious dairy product with their own hands.

In fact, homemade cheese is quite simple to prepare; you just need to decide on the recipe and stock up on all the necessary ingredients, as well as kitchen utensils.

The advantage of homemade hard cheese is that it is actually made from natural ingredients and does not contain additional substances in the form of thickeners, flavors and preservatives, which are harmful to our body to one degree or another.

But at the same time, cheese made at home turns out to be unusual in taste and structure, which, in fact, is due to the inclusion of those same additional components in the production technology.

Choosing milk

There are many recipes, and they all differ in ingredients and production technology. But among all the ingredients that appear in the recipe of hard cheeses, one is constant - milk.

Large-scale production involves the use of farm milk, but we do not know in what form it enters the production line. Perhaps it is already diluted, or all sorts of thickeners are used - this is all kept by the companies, as they say, behind closed doors.

In the case of making homemade hard cheese, we advise you to purchase the main ingredient from housewives who breed cows and have medical certificates confirming that their pets are healthy. Simply put, you should give preference to those raw materials whose quality does not raise even the slightest doubt.

Be sure to read:

Cooking Dutch cheese: a practical recipe with photos

It is impossible to boil milk before the preparation procedure for the purpose of sterilization, therefore it must initially be devoid of pathogenic and pathogenic microflora.

If it is not possible to purchase homemade milk, then store-bought milk will do. But you should choose it based on several rules:

1. We give preference to a product with a minimum shelf life. This suggests that the milk was subjected to minimal heat treatment.
2. Fresh milk is not suitable for preparing the product. It should rest for at least 5-8 hours after milking. But too much infused milk is not suitable - it should not be older than 3 days.
3. We carefully read the composition of milk. It should not indicate the presence of dry ingredients from which the product was diluted. That is, the milk should be whole, and not diluted from dry powder. Otherwise, such a product will not curdle.

Choosing cottage cheese

Cottage cheese is selected in the same way. The ideal option would be a homemade product. It is also possible to produce cottage cheese yourself. But it should also be made from high quality raw materials.

Important! The quality of the prepared product depends on the quality of the starting ingredients. The more natural they are, the better the taste and structure of homemade hard cheese!

Curd cheese with herbs - recipe

Delicious homemade cottage cheese with herbs is prepared as simply as the classic one. It is necessary to supplement the laconic composition of the product with chopped fresh dill, parsley, cilantro, basil or a mix of several herbs. The appetizer with the addition of stalk celery and cucumber is especially piquant and at the same time fresh.

Ingredients:

• cottage cheese – 500 g;
• butter – 100 g;
• stalk celery – 1 pc.;
• dill – 1 bunch;
• fresh cucumber – ½ piece;
• salt - to taste.

Preparation:

1. The cottage cheese is mixed with softened butter and punched with a blender.
2. Grind the cucumber and celery in a blender, adding sprigs of dill.
3. Add the green mixture to the curd mixture, beat again and place the mixture in the refrigerator for a while.

Some tips from experienced cheese makers

Let's reveal some secrets that will help you not spoil your homemade cheese:

• Do not use an aluminum or cast iron pan, otherwise the product will have a metallic taste;
• any gauze can be used again by first washing it with cold water and bleach and then boiling it;
• It is best to use special plastic containers for cheese. They are not expensive at all, have any shape, and are equipped with drainage holes;
• You can safely make the press yourself. A can of water or bottle will do. On average, 1 kilogram of cheese requires a press of 2 kilos. However, this parameter can be adjusted to suit you.

Calorie content

If you decide to make real hard cheese and see that you succeeded, you should understand that the calorie content will be approximately equal to hard cheese from the store. The exact nutritional value of such a product greatly depends on what kind of milk was used, therefore, for different types of cheese, the energy value can range from a relatively modest 210 kcal to a very dangerous 360 kcal. For this reason, it is easier to determine calorie content based on the original product and its quantity.

You should not think that calories are strictly preserved, but you will probably be able to find an approximate result - in this case, a small percentage should be subtracted from the total amount of calories, because the resulting whey is also not a completely low-fat product.

A similar picture is observed with BJU indicators, only proteins and carbohydrates, unlike fats, are usually presented in milk in approximately standard quantities. If you trust those experts who indicate that homemade cheese contains 110 kcal, then it turns out that the product contains 12.7% protein, approximately 5% fat, and about 4% carbohydrates. In practice, in real hard cheese the protein content will be approximately twice as high, and the fat content will be approximately three times higher, while the carbohydrate content in the final product is 2-3 times less than 4%.

Requirements for main ingredients

To obtain the perfect product, you only need a few ingredients:

• milk;
• leaven;
• rennet extract;
• salt.

But such a composition is rare; it is much easier to prepare cheese from a larger list of products.

Requirements for ingredients for production:

• Fat and high-quality milk, best homemade or farm milk from trusted sellers. The fattier the product, the tastier and more tender the cheese will be.
• Do not boil the milk first, as this will “kill” all the beneficial substances.
• To increase the fat content of a dairy product, add cream or sour cream. Country style is not suitable.
• Non-iodized sea salt with small crystals can be used. First, it dissolves in water (30-40 g per 10 liters of milk). Then the brine needs to be filtered and can be added to the rest of the ingredients.
• The following is used as a starter: sour cream;
• eggs;
• kefir.

How to make marble cheese

The main feature of marble cheese is its unique color and pattern obtained when cut. It was previously thought that it was impossible to do this at home, but this turned out not to be the case.

Required Products:

• 400 grams of sour cream;
• 6 chicken eggs;
• 2 liters of milk;
• 150 milliliters of carrot juice;
• a tablespoon of salt.

Cooking time is about 50 minutes of active process and 6 hours of maturation.

The calorie content will be about 325 kilocalories per 100 grams of cheese.

Preparation procedure:

• The first step is to divide the products into 2 parts so that the first contains: 200 grams of sour cream, 3 eggs, a liter of milk, all the juice, half a tablespoon of salt. Accordingly, the rest will go into the second part;
• the first container is filled with milk, which is brought to a boil;
• add salt (half a spoon);
• sour cream, eggs and juice mixed in one bowl are gradually added to a pan with boiling milk;
• The mixture boils for about 5 minutes until the curd is completely separated from the whey. In this case, the components are constantly mixed;
• a colander is covered with gauze and the contents of the pan are poured onto it to drain the liquid;
• The second part of the cheese mass is prepared in a completely similar way, but juice is excluded from the ingredients, so the color will be white;
• Having gotten rid of the liquid from the first part of the cheese, move the mass into a bowl, and in its place pour the second part and let the whey drain for 10 minutes;
• pour the first part from the bowl into a colander with gauze and light cheese mixture. We carefully mix the ingredients so that we get the pattern we need (without enthusiasm);
• hang the gauze over the sink for 20 minutes (this will remove excess moisture);
• Place the finished cheese in the mold and press for 6 hours, after which the hard marble cheese is moved to the refrigerator.

Step-by-step recipe for Adyghe cheese made from milk and kefir

To try soft and delicate cheese, you don’t have to look for it in the store. You can prepare it yourself from the simplest and most affordable products. Homemade is always better and tastier. It will take some time to ferment, but the result will be amazing.

Ingredients:

• Milk - 3 l
• Kefir - 1 l
• Salt - 3 teaspoons

Preparation:

1. Pour kefir into a saucepan and heat until the whey appears and the curd begins to clump. This takes approximately 5 minutes.

2. Drain the whey into a separate bowl through a sieve or cheesecloth. You won't need cottage cheese for further preparation, so put it in the refrigerator or you can eat it right away. And leave the whey itself to sour at room temperature for two days.

3. In two days we will continue preparing our product. Pour milk into a saucepan and bring it to a boil. Then reduce the heat and pour in the whey. Cook over low heat for 7 minutes until the cheese floats and separates from the whey.

4. Place a colander in a deep bowl so that liquid can drain from it. Place cheesecloth in a colander and drain the contents of the pan, add salt and spices to taste, but not necessarily. Cover the top of the product with gauze, place something flat on it, and then something heavy (a press). And leave it like this in the refrigerator for a day.

5. After a day, remove from the refrigerator, remove from the gauze, transfer to a plate and you can eat very tasty, tender, Adyghe cheese.

Delicious delicacy with homemade mold

This type of cheese has a huge cost, so not everyone can buy it. It’s all because of the taste, which is almost impossible to put into words. However, there is a way to try the delicacy by preparing it at home. For this you will need:

• special culture P. Roqueforti. This is a safe and beneficial type of mold for the body, which is quite easily found in online stores. One bag is enough for 1000 liters, so we need the edge of a teaspoon;
• 8 liters of milk;
• 0.25 teaspoon mesophilic starter;
• the same amount of rennet;
• 0.25 teaspoon calcium chloride;

The preparation time will be about 16 days, with the active part of the process taking no more than 2 hours.

Calorie content - 340 kcal per 100 grams.

Method for making hard blue cheese at home:

• the milk is brought to a uniform temperature of 27 to 33 degrees. The process is controlled using a special culinary thermometer;
• After this, sourdough and mold spill out. However, you cannot mix them together; two spoons are used to add;
• take a slotted spoon of the appropriate size and slowly mix the product;
• also, at the same time, calcium chloride dissolved in 100 grams of water is poured out;
• without stopping the mixing process, the enzyme is added;
• leave the pan with the contents for 2 hours;
• the resulting thick mass is transferred to a colander lined with gauze;
• The gauze is suspended for 60 minutes to remove liquid. For such an amount of milk, one bag of cheese mass is not enough; there will be several of them. Therefore, it is necessary to take care of the hanging and draining areas in advance;
• each bag of product along with gauze is placed under a press for 12 hours;
• after this the cheese is broken into small pieces and salted;
• the salted product is placed in prepared forms and placed in the refrigerator for 48 hours;
• at the end of two days, using a wooden stick, holes are made in the cheese for the air needed by the mold;
• the product is moved into containers with drainage holes and at a temperature of 10 degrees (cellar or refrigerator set accordingly) ripens for about 2 weeks;
• and only now can you get ready-made hard blue cheese, treat your friends and acquaintances to it, and then be surprised at its enormous cost in the store.