Roo's Cottage Cheese #1

[Roo]

Made my very first cheese ever, finished it last night.  While it was my first cheese, and I am very excited about it I can see where more work will need to be done.  I used the small curd recipe out of Ricki Carroll's book Home Cheese Making.
First picture is bringing the 2% store bought milk (1 US Gallon) along with 4 ounces a mesophilic starter, recipe found on this board, and 1/8 tsp calcium chloride in 1/4 cup water up to 72 degrees.

Second Picture is the milk all wrapped up and in the oven as suggested by a member on this board.  Preheated the oven to 350 then turned it off and placed the wrapped bowl into the oven for the night. 

Third picture, is the break.  She said it would be a soft curd and it was.

Fourth is bringing the curd up to 100 degrees heading for 112 for 30 minutes.

[Roo]

Continuing . . .

the 1st is of the curd heating during the 1/2 hour at 112 degrees. I made the mistake of over stirring, thus reducing the curd size.  This will be shown later.

2nd is the curd being allowed to head to the bottom of the whey, I was surprised at how yellow the whey was, don't know why, just was.

Finally the finished product.  After the whey was poured off, the bag was dipped in a pan of cold water to 1, remove some of the tang, and 2. stop the cooking.  Once it was dunked I let it rest for 5 minutes and then into the bowl and salted.  You can see how small the curds got and how clumped they became.  I also think this caused it to be dry. 

After a night in the refrigerator, I found this to be about the best cottage cheese I have had.  It was very deep in flavor, almost to the point of being overpowering.  Very rich and somewhat creamy.

[Roo]

So what I learned is patience is indeed needed in the making of cheese.  When I woke up yesterday morning it didn't look like anything was happening.  But 12 hours later it was ready to got he rest of the way.

Patience is also needed in the warming of the curd.  I understand now why this is important.

Cutting the curd will be something for me to work on.  I think I got carried away.

Stirring to prevent the curds from clumping does not mean beating the holy heck out of them.

While it was somewhat of a failure, I think I learned alot and the next one will be much better.  I am finding this to be an exciting hobby for sure.

My wife was very hesitent while I was in the process of making this, she said she wasn't sure I could make cheese as we had a difficult time with beer making and wine making so she wasn't holding out hope. 
I called her over to the sink last night and she looked at the bowl of cheese and she said "holy *&^% you made cottage cheese"    I think she will be blown away with the flavor and richness, but will have problems with the texture.

[Tea]

Congrats on the cottage cheese.  This is one of my favourite cheeses, with fruit and honey, yum.
Hope you wife liked the final result.

[Roo]

I never thought of honey and cottage cheese, that sounds really good.  Now that I have the cheese will have to give that a go.

[Cheese Head]

Hey Roo, congrats, I've never tried making Cottage Cheese but I think yours looks great!

I've posted a Cottage Cheese Recipe webpage, probably very similar to what you have.

Great notes and thoughts advice for others who follow in your footsteps.

[Likesspace]

Roo, fantastic post!
Cottage cheese was also my first cheese and just today I was thinking that I need to give it another try.
It honestly is one of my favorite cheeses and I'm not sure why I haven't made it again. So many cheeses, so little time (sigh).
I have no doubt that you will be making GREAT cheese in the very near future.
You went through the process and saw where you can make improvements.....in my opinion that is the perfect process to follow in making great cheese.

Dave