Cheese the Second: Lemon and Orange Curd Cheese

The cheese: Lemon and Orange Curd Cheese (Carroll, p.79)
The milk: 1/2 gallon 365 Organic Vitamin D Milk (label expressly said it is not ultrapasteurized)

This may be the simplest cheese to make.

Although it was probably unnecessary with this cheese, I decided to keep good habits, and sterilize the muslin, a large spoon and the thermometer in a couple of inches of water in the pot I was using. Of course, this went much faster than heating the whole pot of water last time.

After 5 minutes of sterilizing, I dumped the water and let the utensils cool while I heated the milk to 205 degrees. Even though I stirred, a little bit of milk managed to stick to the bottom. I let what was there stay.

The recipe called for 6 lemons and 6 oranges worth of juice. I was halving the recipe and I have rather large fruit on my backyard citrus trees, so I figured I needed 1/4 cup of each type of juice.

The juice got stirred in and curdled the milk, it sat for a bit, then got drained in the muslin. Bingo, cheese.

Yield was supposed to the about 1 pound, my result was 12.95 ounces.

We tasted it on crackers. It was still very mild, with just a hint of the citrus. I intend to make it again, with more juice and plenty of pulp to give it a more pronounced citrus taste. The texture was more 'curdy' and less 'creamy' than I had hoped for.