Epic Cheese Fail

You all know that I am experimenting with raw milk. I am totally enthralled with raw milk. You can use every part of it. You can use it when it "spoils". (Note, it doesn't spoil. It sours. How great is nature? Why do we buy milk at the store?)

I decided I would start with something easy. Apparently making cream cheese is like the easiest thing. Well...

I let the milk sit out for a day. It got thick, like yogurt in water. Then I dumped the milk goo into a strainer lined with a towel. I need to buy cheesecloth.

Doesn't that look super appetizing? Here's something interesting...I let this milk just sit on the counter for a day. Then I let this gross looking slop sit on the counter for hours. It didn't smell. Ok, it smelled a little, but more like little boy feet. (Which is a smell I have in my house frequently.)

Here is where I went wrong...

You are supposed to just let this drain. You can hang it and let it drain.

Don't you like my fancy setup? Anyhow, I squeezed all of the liquid out of this. I shouldn't have. To make cream cheese you need some liquid left. Whoops.

I got a lovely, crumbly farmer's cheese. Not cream cheese. I even tried this a second time, with about the same results. I think I need to let it sit out for just a few hours.

Next time I will try the cream cheese again. For now we are just going to munch on the cheese we have sitting in the fridge.

Here is what is even more cool about the raw milk: the whey. You can do about 100 things with whey. We are going to give it to the chickens. I am not quite ready to try lacto-fermentation. I may in the future. You can also use it to make more cheese. Can you believe it? You can use it to make ricotta cheese. You just let it sit out and get all fermenty and then you cook it or something.

I think my adventures in raw milk are over for now. Until I get some more from that adorable Amish lady...or until Kyle buys me a cow.