Cottage Cheese

Thanks to Ramont (and now sometimes Anna) milking Susie every morning, we are awash in milk - usually 1.5 to 2 gallons a day. Of course we drink a lot and use it for oatmeal, rice pudding, all-out pudding, soups, smoothies, and so on. And we also "get rid of" a number of gallons per week to family and friends. But every few days it begins to stockpile in the fridge. Then I make some higher-milk-volume items like...well, I'm going to be sharing some of these recipes and processes from time to time. Today it's cottage cheese. Because is there any better way to make verenike (or these or these) than with tangy homemade glums? (No) And actually, it's the easiest thing to do with a glut of milk, especially if it's a few days old. So here goes...

Cottage Cheese

1. Pour skimmed milk into a large pot, and let sit on the counter for a few days until it thickens. The final consistency should be similar to yogurt (see photo above). Our house is approx. 68 degrees and it takes exactly two days to get a good thickness.

2. Skim off the top, gummy layer of creamy skin. Pulling it off by hand is easiest (and oddly satisfying).

3. Once thick, set the pot of thick milk on a medium-low burner (I use level 5), stirring every 5 minutes or so, until it begins to curdle. This can take anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes.

4. It is done when the little curds are separated from the clear-ish whey. At that point you can reach in for a handful, give it a squeeze, and see if it resembles cottage cheese. (Yes)

5. Then figure out a system to separate the curds from the whey. My Bolivian cousins just reach in and grab the curds by the handful, squeeze, and put them in a colander. I've also tried to strain them through a sieve lined with a cheesecloth (actually, a tea towel or clean t-shirt scrap). That's a bit slow, but it is a good way to get the last bits at the bottom.

6. Then you need to find yourself a kitchen helper, preferably someone with a thick mat of bedhead, who can take everything out of the drawers, organize them, and put them back in slightly differently.

7. You can also at this point start a batch of bread and use the whey in place of water. Very nutritious, I assume. The whey is also good as soup stock or smoothie liquid.

8. When you've squeezed out the water to your desired level of cottage cheese dryness, add some salt and squish it in well with your hands.

And that's it! You don't even have to do steps 6 and 7, so it's really very simple.

This particular batch made about 3 cups (or 1.5 lbs) from 1.5 gallons of milk. It freezes well in simple plastic bags or other containers, and it's also good fresh.

Happy cheese-making!