My latest project has been fermenting dairy. I never thought I'd get to this place. I don't really know how it happened. But here I am. In a past life (before going to nutrition school, and definitely before meeting James) I ate cheese by the pound. I remember having a "cheese party" with my friends in college, where we celebrated our favorite cheeses- mine has always been brie. We ate smoked gouda, brie, gorgonzola, cheddar, mozzarella, and probably a few more varieties- all in one night, accompanied by lots of alcohol. That did not make for the best feeling the next morning. But it was a great celebration, I do recall. When I was on a backcountry skiing trip in college we ate pounds and pounds of cheese each day to stay warm in the negative temperatures as we traveled up and down mountains on our skiis hauling our packs. Those were glorious days. But then I actually stopped to listen my body after eating cheese- REALLY listened to it, and it told me some not so nice stories. My digestions actually wasn't so happy. I always felt a bit sluggish, tired and bloated after eating cheese. I was never aware of this until I stopped to think about it- satisfied from my "cheese high", why should I have noticed it? I had just eaten some great cheese!
So, to make this long cheesey story shorter, as the primary food buyer for my family, we don't consume any cheese, or dairy for that matter in our house. This is not true. I give yogurt to the dogs. As I've said before, our dogs eat well (and if you are that interested, ask and I can elaborate, but that is not what I'm writing about today). I have recently had this huge urge to ferment vegetables. In the past I have simply gone to the store and bought some lovely small scale produced lacto-fermented kimchi or other lovely vegetable combo. That was when we lived in Maine. People in Maine love to make anything they possibly can, and sell it too. That is not as much the case here in Mexico. I have yet to see one jar of fermented ANYTHING. I am craving it so much, finally getting motivation to make my own. So what does fermenting vegetables have to do with dairy? After doing lots of research (I highly recommend Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions and Sandor Ellix Katz's The Art of Fermentation) I discovered that dairy actually has a huge role in fermenting vegetables- at least the way I have been accustomed to eating them. Lacto-fermentation uses the whey that is created as the bi-product of producing many fermented dairy products. Remember "Little Miss Muffet, who sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey"? Whey is the liquid that separates from solids when raw milk, yoghurt, and cream are all given the opportunity to settle.
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| Yogurt in cheesecloth in strainer over a bowl |
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| Hanging cheesecloth and whey from the first few hours of straining |
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| Cream cheese 36 hours later! |
In my experimentation so far I've made cream cheese. I used 2 quarts of plain yogurt, strained them with a cheese cloth inside of a strainer, over a bowl. The liquid that dripped out of the yogurt is whey, and what was left turned into cream cheese. It was really that easy! And I must say, the cream cheese tastes much different (and exceptionally better) than any cream cheese I've had from the store. I stored the liquid (whey) in mason jars in the fridge that I will use later this week to begin my vegetable lacto-fermentation process. I will write more on that later. For now I am very excited about my new project, and I'm curious to see if anyone in my house actually eats all this cream cheese that I produced, or maybe I will just end up feeding it to the dogs (nothing goes to waste...) Next on my list is lacto fermented veggies. I will update on here when progression occurs!
