Yummy!

I made mozzarella!  I bought a kit so that Todd and I could make cheese.  He bought the milk, and the directions say that it's best with the freshest milk you can buy.  Unfortunately, Todd was busy, so I made it on my own.  Hey, it HAD to be done!

Want to know a little secret?  It was *really* easy!  

Here is a pic of all the ingredients:

First step after heating the milk, is to add citric acid.  It starts curdling the milk.

Then after the milk gets to a certain temp, you add the rennet.  The curdling goes into overdrive.

Then once it reaches a certain temp and cooks for a certain time, you have curds & whey.

Way cool

It seemed like after I pulled out the curds, I had just as much whey as I did milk that I had poured into the pan.  Such a cool magic trick!  There are actually a lot of things you can do with whey.  You can cook it again to make a little bit of ricotta (which I did), you can use it to bake bread, and you can give it to your dogs on their food.  The last option is my favorite.

After pressing out all the liquid from the tender curds, you heat it up.  In the microwave!  It was so odd to cook it in the microwave, but the directions said to!  After reaching a certain temp, I got to burn my hands play with my food.  I stretched the cheese and folded it onto itself.  The more you work with it, the tougher it will be. 

I chose to make two small balls of mozzarella, and chill them in ice water before refrigerating them.  And here is the finished product!  It is creamy, yummy and slightly nutty tasting almost.

Todd and I really like it.  It's not a cheap alternative to buying it, however you can't buy something this fresh tasting.  Can't wait to make it again, with herbs next time!

Crafty New Year!

HappyCrafty New Year to you!  I've had a lot of projects going on lately (or rumbling around in my head that I intend to do).  Just can't wait to share them with you.

Here's one I tried to get done for Christmas, but just didn't manage to.  I saw this on Pinterest and had to try it.  So off to the store I went for bobby pins and gold spray paint.

Who wouldn't love their name in pasta?!?

Mine did not turn out as neat as the Pinterest post, because the glue I used wasn't real smooth, and the pasta I used wasn't uniformly sized.  But hey, I already had the alphabet pasta in a soup mix, I just had to pick it out of the lentils.  I tried to find alphabet pasta and our normal grocery stores did not carry it, so I used what I had!

Up next, we are making homemade mozzarella cheeeeeeese this weekend!  For home cooked pizza.  Can't wait for dinner!  I will post soon of our cheesy experience. 

Until then, let me leave you with a beautiful picture of my beautiful friend and her beautiful horses.  I'm so happy I got to see them for a brief visit last month!

Beautiful horses!

Beautiful redheads

Bon Appetit!