We start with a colby cheese. That's a hard cheese that is a bit milder and more to my taste than the farmhouse cheddar that Mark used to make. We buy all our cheese supplies such as the cultures and cheese wax from Green Living Australia They have a little booklet that guides you through some of the simpler cheeses. Mainly we make our cheeses and yoghurt when our cows are milking but they are dry at the moment so we tend to buy Biodynamic milk when it's on sale.
While the colby is sitting to allow the culture to do it;s thing we start on the Paneer. Paneer is an Indian style of cheese closely resembling a haloumi but it is not cultured. It is my favourite cheese and we have it with either spinach as in Palak paneer, with a tomato sort of sauce or in a vegie stack or even in fried rice or a stir fry. So versatile and great for us vegetarians as a protein source.
Once the whey has drained off the colby we then make a whey ricotta. I just used the one we made in spinach and ricotta triangles for lunch. It can also be used in sweet dishes such as cheesecake.Actually one of our participants on Saturday was an 11 yr old girl who plans to make a dish using her own ricotta for her audition on junior MasterChef!
Everyone went home feeling confident to make some cheese.
On Sunday we offered to have the 2 littlies while their mum and dad had some special time with the newest little one.They were coming to spend the night and stay for the whole day on Monday. Now Monday's around here are workdays so we needed to be able to keep the little ones safe while we worked alongside them in the garden.
There was a lovely little spot in the garden that I thought would be quite inviting to a 2yrold and his 4yr old sister.
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| Helping Pop |
So with a bit of cutting here and a bit of lopping there and a bit of sand and mulch we came up with the perfect play area . Or at least they think so!
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| Warn out after a hard days work |
Those cheeses are makin' me hungry! And the sandpit is so very cute.
ReplyDeleteYour class sounds like so much fun! The only cheese I have ever made is paneer, but I would love to make others.
ReplyDeleteLove the pictures of the wee ones...they are beautiful! How much fun to have them over night and the next day.
Cheesemaking, is there no end to your skills. Excellent solution to a Monday dilemma, Cute kidlets.
ReplyDeleteDeb
Thanks guys. I've gotta say the best part was definitely the kids.
ReplyDeleteWhat beautiful children. You are so clever with all the things you can do Kate. I can see that I am going to have to book into some of your courses , cheesemaking looks great.
ReplyDeleteThanks Kim. See you soon.
ReplyDeleteWhat sweet little darlings they are.
ReplyDeletewhen they are asleep!!!!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for your lovely visit !!
ReplyDeleteYour farm looks wonderful and what a great way to help with the environment.
The cheese looks great !!!
The kids must have had a fantastic day, they look totally worn out ; )
Have a great day.
The cheese making workshop sounds like fun and What a lovely spot for a sand pit. I like the recycled buckets.
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