Last Friday was full of food firsts. I had an amazing dinner with my friend Nicole and her boyfriend that I helped to make (just enough so that I felt justified in eating a lot of it). We made ravioli from scratch with a pasta maker (first #1). It was really fun and the dough was a lot stretchier than I expected. Nicole has a ravioli form that was so easy to use; I'm thinking of getting one without the frilly edges to use when I make pierogies for Wigilia, the traditional Polish Christmas Eve dinner that I have with my family every year. In the past I've used a glass to cut the form, then tried to fill them and press the dough together with a fork or with some water to glue the edges down. No matter what, the filling comes out when we boil them and they are ridiculous-looking, but everyone is nice about it and eats them anyway.
While this was all happening, I made cheese, first #2. Sounds weird, but I did and it was so easy and it tastes great! I heated a gallon of whole milk to a slow boil, then I took it off the heat and added a 1/2 cup of vinegar to make it curdle. I strained it through a cheese-cloth-lined colander, added some salt, and hung it to drip for a little bit. It looked like cauliflower afterward, but it tasted like warm hardened ricotta cheese. Yummy. Unfortunately, blogger won't let me put up pictures that have a vertical orientation, so I can't show you the pictures of the cheese.
Finally, Nicole made ice cream in her ice cream maker, using honey to sweeten it and putting actual vanilla beans in for the vanilla flavor. I'm counting that as a first as well, even though my only participation was to bring berries to put on top, and to eat the ice cream.
The whole cheese thing was inspired by this book I got from the local public library "Wild Fermentation: The flavor, nutrition, and craft of live-culture foods" by Sandor Ellix Katz. I will definitely write more about it later, because I am trying out a lot of the recipes in it. I have a sourdough starter going right now (picture above) and I've just made the "sponge" for some bread that I will bake tomorrow. So look forward to hearing about the trials and tribulations of bread-making. I'm flying back home for Easter this weekend too, so there will probably also be some stuff about the trials and tribulations of air travel in future posts. Fun.
While this was all happening, I made cheese, first #2. Sounds weird, but I did and it was so easy and it tastes great! I heated a gallon of whole milk to a slow boil, then I took it off the heat and added a 1/2 cup of vinegar to make it curdle. I strained it through a cheese-cloth-lined colander, added some salt, and hung it to drip for a little bit. It looked like cauliflower afterward, but it tasted like warm hardened ricotta cheese. Yummy. Unfortunately, blogger won't let me put up pictures that have a vertical orientation, so I can't show you the pictures of the cheese.
Finally, Nicole made ice cream in her ice cream maker, using honey to sweeten it and putting actual vanilla beans in for the vanilla flavor. I'm counting that as a first as well, even though my only participation was to bring berries to put on top, and to eat the ice cream.
The whole cheese thing was inspired by this book I got from the local public library "Wild Fermentation: The flavor, nutrition, and craft of live-culture foods" by Sandor Ellix Katz. I will definitely write more about it later, because I am trying out a lot of the recipes in it. I have a sourdough starter going right now (picture above) and I've just made the "sponge" for some bread that I will bake tomorrow. So look forward to hearing about the trials and tribulations of bread-making. I'm flying back home for Easter this weekend too, so there will probably also be some stuff about the trials and tribulations of air travel in future posts. Fun.
2 comments:
Cheese. You made. cheese. Girl, that is so cool. I've always wanted to at least make yogurt cheese. My mom has done the cheesemaking you refer to with the cheesecloth; I think it might be a Hungarian thing (mom's Hungarian). And, you can use that cheese *in* the pierogies! (dad's Polish).
yeah well I made microwave ravioli last night. now what!
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