Wow, I completely screwed up my first cheese. I made an attempt at Queso Fresco today and it didn't go well. I used the recipe and directions on the Wiki recipe here for queso fresco, but after 90minutes my curd had really only halfway set. I never got what I would say was an obvious clean break. The curd didn't change at all from the 40min mark to the 90 min mark, so I decided to continue with cutting the curd, bringing it up to temp and draining it. Only about a quarter of it was formed into semi formed curds. It was very wet and didn't drain much of the whey off. It's about the consistency of a grainy cream cheese and tastes just like the curd part of cottage cheese.
I think my main problem was that I used some old rennet. It was is my cheese making kit that I got from my mom on my birthday in April, and since I didn't know how to store rennet then, it sat in our room temp pantry for upwards of 7 months before I got around to using it today. Also, the recipe never said how much to use, so I just guessed at about 1/2 tablet for 1gal milk and 1/2 gal buttermilk. Maybe I should have just let the milk go on setting until I got a clean break, just I noticed no difference at all between minute 40 and minute 90, so I figured it wasn't going to do much of anything else.
I've already ordered some fresh rennet, cultures, lipase and new cheese clothe (I think the cloth I got with the kit was too coarse for a soft cheese). I hope my next one goes better. I'm just itching to do a butterkase, but I need to hone my skills first.