[Sca-cooks] Suggestions for soft cheese?

[Donna Green]

In Answer to Ranvaig --
 
> How long did you let it drain? Perhaps it needs to drain longer.
> Ranvaig

Milk takes much longer to coagulate with nettle tincture than with rennet (overnight as opposed to a few minutes). 
I let the cheese drain a few hours and took some out of the draining bags and then put in the rest of the curds to drain overnight. The overnight curds showed minimal additional draining. Perhaps a looser weave cheese cloth would have been useful :-)
 
In Answer to Tre -- 
 
> How did you make the tincture of stinging nettles? It sounds interesting to play with.
 
I ran a pound of stinging nettles through the food processor. Stinging nettles sting, so I didn't want to chop by hand :-) Then put in a pot and add water to cover. Boil then simmer for 20 to 30 minutes. Let cool. Strain. Strain again. Add salt. 
 
> Secondly...I haven't done cheese with rennet, but I've done it with lemon juice or vinegar. Would this work the same way?
 
Lemon juice and vinegar also give you soft cheese, so any recipe suggestions (that I hope are forthcoming) should work for those cheeses as well.
 
> ...or maybe it needs to be squeezed harder instead of just drained. I made "green cheese" (or "pot cheese") using vinegar or lemon juice to curdle the milk. When I drained it, I also had to squeeze the cheesecloth pretty hard to get the whey out, and kept it tied fairly hard in the cheesecloth for a few hours/overnight.
 
I did squeeze the bags and that helped a bit, but the final product is still quite soft. I've been making mostly aged cheeses lately, so I am familiar with the process for separating curds from whey :-)
 
> As far as recipes, try looking for a recipe for an "Ember day tart". There are several variations, but it does use soft cheese.

Yes, Ember day is in the list of cheese cake like period thingies in Stefan's wonderful archive and I've selected a couple to use this cheese for. I was just looking for other sorts of things as well.
 
Thanks,
 
Juana Isabella