Making cheese without dairy animals? Friday update

[Dace]

Is it realistic to attempt cheese making when I do not have goats, sheep or cows?

I am trying to source some milk now, but I wonder if it is cost effective to even attempt cheese making.

Thoughts?

 

[savingdogs]

I have a book here that talks about making cheese just from milk from the store. I never tried it, but I always thought milk had to be raw to make cheese and it doesn't, you just have to add ingredients to make it work correctly. I don't have personal experience with it though.

 

[Dace]

In culinary school we did make a cheese with pasteurized milk.....but I would prefer to work with raw.

A 1/2 gal of raw cows milk is $10 here thru the health food stores. I did find a potential local source for $3 a gal for goats milk . Which would be awesome if it works out.

 

[TanksHill]

$3 bucks a gallon???

Is it near me????

that would be so great, I hope it works out.

g

 

[miss_thenorth]

I believe Pat was making cheese with store bought milk, she loved making cheese, so she got sheep so she could have her own source of milk.

 

[Dace]

Sorry, Gina...I just double checked and the ad said $3 qt or $5 for 2 qts.

They are in El Cajon......might be a bit of a drive for you, but if she ever responds, I will let you know if she is still selling.

 

[patandchickens]

Yup, I've made a buncha various cheese with storeboughten milk -- the caveat being, this is from a local dairy co-op, and is both pretty fresh AND not pasteurized all that hot. Having experimented around (and wasted a certain amount ) I would say that there are some things you can do and some things you can't.

If you have to use national-brand American grocery store milk, I would say you may be limited to paneer/"whole milk ricotta"/acid-coagulated type things, from which a version of ricotta salata can also be made. You could TRY doing a basic farmer cheese type hard cheese, with added calcium chloride, and see what happens. But with milk worse than what I'm working with from my store, which is already fairly limiting, I don't think you'd expect to do much with older hotter-pasteurized stuff.

Yes, that's why I got sheep

I have not unfortunately really got them into production-type milking this year, due to one thing and another, and now it is almost too late in their lactation to do much good. If circumstances allow me to still have them next year though I will be FAR better prepared and hopefully WILL make a significant amount of sheep yogurt and sheep cheese.

But, back to your situation -- just get the freshest and coolest-pasteurized milk you can, and try some simple things and see what happens.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[gettinaclue]

but I wonder if it is cost effective to even attempt cheese making.Thoughts?

I looked at this as well and didn't see any savings.

A gallon of milk can get pretty pricey and then the supplies to make cheese and you really don't get much cheese from a gallon.

Let me know if you come up with something. I would love to hear it!

In the meantime, I'm still gonna experiement occasionally - just 'cause I wanna play, but I don't see making cheese from grocery store milk very economical at all.

 

[Bubblingbrooks]

In culinary school we did make a cheese with pasteurized milk.....but I would prefer to work with raw.

A 1/2 gal of raw cows milk is $10 here thru the health food stores. I did find a potential local source for $3 a gal for goats milk . Which would be awesome if it works out.

Whoa! Take it! Goat milk costs $10 a gallon up here! Hence the reason we are looking into doing shares a few years

 

[patandchickens]

I wonder if it is cost effective to even attempt cheese making.

If you are going to make whole-milk ricotta, whole-milk ricotta salata, or paneer, (or yogurt), then I'd say yes.

For anything else, I'd say absolutely no chance.

I do it with storeboughten milk b/c it's really interesting and b/c that's the best I can do until I get my sheep into actual production... NOT as a cost saving measure

Pat