Say Cheese!

In preparation for my trip to Rome, my friend and I made mozzarella.  Okay, it really didn't have anything to do with my trip, but I can pretend, right?  Rose had been talking about making cheese forever and, as a result, had received some cheese making kits as gifts.  I was happy to help her out as cheese is one of my favorite things! 

The first step was dissolving both rennet and citric acid in water.

After heating a gallon of whole milk, we then poured the citric acid into the milk.

Once that was incorporated, we added the dissolved rennet little by little while simultaneously moving the spoon up and down.

We then allowed the mixture to set for what was supposed to be five minutes, but was more like ten.  Once we could separate the curd from the whey, it was time to cut the curds.

 

I won't lie, the cut curds kind of grossed me out.  We had to separate them from the whey and let them drain.

Once they were drained, we separated them into two batches and placed one in a colander in order to dunk it into a water bath heated to the perfect temperature.

After the heat of the water bath activated the proteins in the curd, it was time to stretch it into cheese.

Then we added some salt and molded our stretched cheese into little mozzarella balls.

Little mozzarella balls make for two very happy cheesemakers!