No, it wasn’t mine, but tonight we really enjoyed having home made parmesan on our spaghetti and meatballs.
Gavin, from The Greening Of Gavin fame, recently held a competition to name his new home-made cheese blog (the cheese is home-made; although I guess the blog probably is too). Since he’s a big greenie, and as a play on his main blog name, I suggested he name the blog Green Cheese. Gav liked the name but it was taken, so it became Little Green Cheese.
Pop over and check it out!
The prize for picking the winning name was a chunk of home-made parmesan. I wasn’t sure how that was going to go in the post from Melbourne, but it arrived safe and sound.
I was a bit nervous about wasting it, and wanted to keep this special cheese for a worthy meal. Tonight I made Tuscan meatballs on spaghetti, and we finally had to opportunity to break out the parmesan.
What can I say – yum! The cheese was excellent!
If you’re interested in how parmesan is made, Gav has a recipe and instructions on his new site – making parmesan.
Cheesemaking is something I’d like to try, but I have so many other projects on the go that I don’t want to take on a new hobby that I know I’ll become obsessed with! If only there were more hours in the day :-).
Have you ever made cheese? How did it go? Do you make it regularly?
Glad you liked it Darren. I love the flavour of this cheese.
Gav
@Gav: It’s truly top-shelf stuff, Gav. You’ve obviously got it down to a fine art, and I highly recommend it to anyone!
I’ve made paneer a few times (an Indian cheese). It’s really easy, and the most complicated bit of kit you need is some cheesecloth. Slowly heat some milk in a heavy saucepan, being careful to keep stirring to avoid the milk sticking on the base of the pan. Heat until it just starts to foam but doesn’t boil, then slowly add an acid with stirring until it curdles (I use vinegar, as I’ve heard that lemon/lime juice can flavour the paneer). Pour it all through a cheesecloth-lined colander, and rinse the curds in cold water with a bit of massaging/mixing to make finer curds and a softer cheese. At that stage, you’ve got cottage cheese, and if you squeeze the moisture out of it then press it in the cloth under a heavy weight you get a block of paneer. I use it a bit like a milk version of tofu in stir-fries, or it’s also good in a butter chicken sauce. I’ve also heard that if you keep the whey and boil the paneer in it, that makes haloumi (which will be my next cheese experiment, I think!)
@Todd: That sounds really interesting – you’ll have to make it the next time you’re down the coast! Butter chicken is one of my favourites too, so bring the Indian recipe book :-). We could have a go at making naan to go with it.