[Sca-cooks] period cheeses

[Mark.S Harris]

Inga Guthbrandsdottir said:
> Hi.  I am new to the group (just joined today).  My persona is late
> 9th/early 10th century Norwegian (yes, Viking).

Welcome to SCA-Cooks!

> I begin with a question.

That's fine. Some of us who have been here since the list started
still ask them. Even ones that seem obvious, sometimes.

> All the cheeses at the feasts I've been to were store-bought and as a
> cheese-lover, I'd like to learn to make fresh, additive-free cheese
> myself. It seems to me that homemade cheese would be more period anyway,
> like homemade bread.

There has been some discussion on that very subject just within the
past few days or weeks. For a bit more on the subject, I recommend
taking a look through these files in the FOOD section of the
Florilegium files:
cheese-msg       (152K)  1/ 8/01    Medieval cheese. Recipes.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/cheese-msg.html
Cheese-Making-art (30K)  9/29/97    "Cheese Making for the Compleat
Novice" by
                                       Lady Aoife Finn.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/Cheese-Making-art.html
cheesecake-msg    (40K)  7/ 6/01    Medieval cheesecake. Recipes.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/cheesecake-msg.html
cheesemaking-msg  (58K)  2/22/01    Comments and info. on cheesemaking.
Recipes.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/cheesemaking-msg.html

>Also, lactaid milk tastes the same as regular milk to
> me so maybe using lactaid milk wouldn't affect the cheese's taste, but have
> the advantage of being edible to lactose-intolerant cheese lovers (are there
> any on this list or that you know of?) who normally can't eat cheese for
> that reason.

Interesting question. I can't remember this being discussed before.

> On vacation in Scandinavia I noticed a wider variety of cheeses and other
> fermented dairy products (kefir, yogurt) in small markets in Norway than I
> see here in large U.S. supermarkets, not to mention types of cheeses never
> seen in the northeastern United States, even in specialty cheese shops.

For a bit more on these kinds of foods check:
dairy-prod-msg    (77K)  9/28/00    Dairy products. milk, butter, curds,
cream.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/dairy-prod-msg.html

Or even more unusual, this file in the BEVERAGES section:
kumiss-msg        (34K)  3/26/01    Mongol drink made from mare's milk.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/BEVERAGES/kumiss-msg.html

I hope this gives you a place to start.

Stefan li Rous
stefan at texas.net