Last-ditch cheese: Ricotta salata

I glossed over it before, but my first attempt to make mozzarella was not so much a success. There are ways to draw success out of failure, however.

Enthusiastic, I had decided to make a full batch of mozzarella, and bought 4 litres of organic cow’s milk to that end. Using both Ideas in Food and Home Cheese Making as my guides, I gently warmed the milk, added citric acid, warmed it some more, added rennet, covered it and let it stand. (I omitted the lipase, because I don’t have any.) After half an hour, the curd looked good, so I cut it into cubes, then heated it and began to stir. That was when it all went wrong.

The curd began to break up into very small grains, looking much like ricotta. Home Cheese Making offers a troubleshooting note for exactly this problem: change your milk.

Now, four litres of organic cow’s milk is not cheap. I did not want to simply write off the money I had spent on it. So I went to my usual fallback position when milk projects go wrong: ricotta. I continued to heat the milk to 200°F, added a bit more citric acid for insurance (though it was probably unnecessary), and let it stand. I strained the results – a sizeable quantity of curd, for which I had no immediate use.

So, drawing inspiration from the A16 cookbook, I tossed it with some salt and pressed it in cheese molds in the fridge for three days, for a makeshift ricotta salata. (“Real” ricotta salata is aged for several weeks. But “real” ricotta salata also doesn’t have rennet in it; as I said to my husband, “This may be a previously unknown kind of cheese, but that doesn’t mean it’s not cheese!”)

After three days of pressing, I dried it out in a low oven for six hours, to make a firm, gratable wheel. It should keep for at least a couple of weeks, and will add a nice, salty touch to pastas and vegetable dishes. Plus, I feel better for not having wasted $13 on milk.

What’s interesting is that, after looking at some pictures of mozzarella curd online, I decided that maybe I didn’t need to change my brand of milk after all. My successful batch of mozzarella, made the following day, used the same brand with slightly more rennet than my first try. The curd was still in smallish grains, but I continued with the recipe anyway, and it all worked out. So, score one for pushing on through even if you have your doubts.