OK Cheesemakers, I'm ready to try it!
 

I think I'm finally going to try it. I'm running out of freezer space so this is the perfect time to try a very EASY recipe.

I would love it if some of you could give me your favorite easy recipe & also directions on what I do & if I need any special pan's, bowls or utensil's, etc.

Also do I need rennet or can I use lemon juice or vinegar instead? If I have to have rennet where do I get it?

Vinegar and rennet make HUGELY different cheeses.

I get almost all my supplies from http://www.cheesemaking.com/

Start with the goat cheese kit, as it has recipes. :)
http://www.cheesemaking.com/DeluxeGoatCheese%20Set.html

(The book that is included has recipes for flavoring your soft goat cheese.)

Always use stainless steel for any cheese making projects.

Chevre (soft goat cheese):
Heat 1 gallon goat milk to 145. Cover and let sit for 30 minutes. Cool to 85 degrees. (I put the pot in a sink of ice water to chill it quickly.) Add chevre culture from source above. Let sit overnight. Drain in cheesecloth lined colander that is set over a bucket or large pot to catch whey. Move to storage containers, chill.

That kit looks good Alice, how many batches does 1/2 oz rennet make?
I'm going to order it & give it a try. Your recipe above sounds really easy.
I'm excited to try it, I sure hope I like it otherwise I don't know what I'm going to do with my extra milk. Hate to feed it to the chickens.
Thanks a bunch!

The chevre packets from that source have the rennet in them, so you can experiment on other cheeses with the rennet.

Most of my other recipes call for 1/2 tsp rennet per 2 gallons of milk.

Here's an EXCELLENT source for new cheesemakers. Just browse and read. :D

http://biology.clc.uc.edu/fankhauser/cheese/cheese.html

I have my cheese recipes formatted as Excel files and checklists. It's easier for me than a recipe with ingredients at the top and a paragraph of instructions.

I'm going to try to cut and paste here. I don't know if it will work.

* * *
That didn't work. Anybody know how to do that?

Well I'm not very computer savvy & need help myself with things here sometimes so I won't be any help at all.
I'm going to check out the link above that you posted last.

The section on beginning Cheese making looks very helpful already & has plenty of recipe's to start me out with easy cheese.
I already bookmarked the site because I'm sure I'll be using it a lot if dh & I like the Goat cheese. Going to start with soft cheeses 1st but eventually would like to try a chedder.
I'm going to order the kit above just to get me started then maybe I can just order the ingredients separate after that from some one. probably cheaper that way too.

For my "lazy Chevre", I just filter a gallon of milk right after milking straight into my a stainless steel stock pot. I sprinkle a half a pinch-ish of mesophilic culture (or a half a dollop-ish of buttermilk) and stir that in. Then I put 5 drops of rennet in a quarter cup-ish of water and stir that in really thoroughly. Once it sets up I spoon it into a (scrupulously clean) piece of old pillowcase, tie it closed with a pony tail holder and hang it up over the sink to drain. No heating, no measuring.

It's lovely lazy cheese. :)

I frequently make my chevre with fresh never chilled milk...but I do mine differently as I have chevre molds :)

I do the buttermilk cheese and my gallon and a half or so of milk makes a HUGE batch of cheese, just don't know what to do with it after that.....How do you all use your chevre...

Yeah, some different ideas on how or what you eat it with would be great.
Also can it be vacuum sealed to keep longer?

Well I just ordered the kit Alice suggested above & a dairy thermometer too. I have stainless steel pan's & bowls so I'm good there.

I divided a batch today. One third dill and garlic. One third ranch dressing. One third cranberry, honey, cinnamon.

I eat it in everything. On salads, cooked in with vegetables (sauteed brussel's sprouts and bacon with chevre added just before serving is amazing), in eggs, savory flavored and served on crackers, or sweet flavored (honey, lemon and ginger - oh my!) and served on ginger snaps. I love it every way!

Different people in my house have different levels of "goatiness" they can tolerate. I can't tolerate any goaty flavor. Chevre does "go goaty" after a little while. The chickens, however, like it no matter how goaty it is. The "ingredients" to make cheese cost only pennies, so I don't mind chucking the remainder of a cheese to the hens and magically turning it into eggs!

Cranberry, Honey & cinnamon sounds like it's right up my alley!

Yea, I don't do goaty flavor either! I have made it twice and since I have no idea what to do with it I froze it until I could figure something out. The cranberry honey cinnamon sounds interesting, so does the ranch, great ideas thanks everyone!

It does just fine frozen, so freeze the excess! Then, if you dry off all or most of your goats, you can start using the frozen stuff.

Thanks everyone for the help & ideas. looking forward to trying it after my kit comes.

All right, don't beat me up for saying this, but the Chevre is what makes me look the other way when these goats annoy me.

Suzyhomemaker09, can you tell me more about the Chevre molds? I too have been using a quick-n-easy method that makes knock-down fantastic Chevre.

By the way, surely I am not the only one who is frustrated with trying to search the internet for cheese molds....

Don't bother with the molds if you already have the other ingredients, etc. It's fun to make the little mold shaped cheeses, but then you have to find something to set the molds on and in for the whey to drain, and you have to worry about them coming out of the molds intact, and you have to store the cute little cheeses so they don't get smooshed.

Just drain it in cheesecloth. :D

Another option:

When I was just starting out in cheesemaking, I was frustrated at the *price* of the molds, so I heated an ice pick and poked/melted holes in some butter tubs, Gladware storage containers and plastic drinking cups. Worked fine for molds.

I'm gonna beat you up if you think you can post about a fantastic Chevre and NOT tell us how you make it! ;)

I use buttermilk to culture my milk for chevre. I couldn't taste a difference between buttermilk and the mesophilic culture. I use buttermilk and liquid rennet.

I myself have had difficulty learning to make cheese - and I'm more than frustrated with Ricki Carrolls book. Case in point - a week ago I tried to make cream cheese - which I've made before with success. I used my freshest milk - pastuerized it, then added the "pre-prepared packet of direct starter." A solid curd was supposed to form. I waited 12 hours. Nothing...so - I added ANOTHEr "pre-prepared packet of direct starter." waited another 12 hours, still no curd. Now my milk has sat for 24 hours!

Had I have known what was actually IN those "pre-prepared packets of direct starter" - (butter milk? Rennet?) I might have been able to salvage something of it. Instead, it went to the chickens and I ended up dashing to the grocer to buy cream cheese - which in the long run turned out to be much cheaper.

I tried to give the book away that day! But my guest - also a good cook - didn't want it!

My best to you. (off rant now)

This book was great when I started making cheese. http://www.leeners.com/cheese/store/...semaking.shtml

Direct starter may not have rennet in it. The chevre culture does, but most do not.

Also..... cream cheese is made with cream, not milk. Or... at least 50% cream. :( I can use chevre or fromage blanc culture to make something *similar* to cream cheese.

Do I have to pastuerize my milk or can it be raw?

Keep trying LFRJ, it sounds like mybe you should start with a kit like Alice posted a link to above. That's what I'm doing. Starting out very easy.
One of the links Alice posted also has a neufetchal cheese recipe that looked easy & is almost the same as Cream cheese in my opinion.

Naw, I won't give up, but I found "Goats Produce Too" and Fankhausers page superior to Ricki Carrolls book because it doesn't use prepared packages, but instead offers the bases i.e. butter milk, rennet, etc. I started with a kit that included a bunch of packets. Have dutifully kept them in the freezer, but apparently they aren't potent any longer. The first couple of times I made cream cheese it turned out well. When the packets are gone though - I don't think I'll buy anymore. I've just had more success with the old fashion ingredients I guess.

Come on over and join our FB group - Raw Milk Cheese @ Home. We have some pretty amazing people over there - lots of experience and wonderful photos :)