Feta cheese recipe
Feta is a PDO since 2002, only cheese form Greece, made from sheep's milk, can be named FETA CHEESE. Feta is white, its texture is dense, but still creamy and crumbly. It has an iconic sour, slightly salty taste.
INGREDIENTS:
- 10 litres of milk
- 1 capsule feta culture
- 2,5-2,7 ml natural rennet 210 IMCU
- 500 g rectangular cheese mould
- iodine free salt (cheese salt)
The milk:
High quality, whole milk, originally sheep's milk. Today Feta can be made from sheep's milk, and up to 30% of goat milk. Even tough it is officially not Feta, cow milk versions are very popular too.
1. CULTURING: Start heating the milk in a big pot. Occasionally stir it.
While it's coming up to heat, dissolve the contents of a culture capsule in some lukewarm water.
At 34-36 °C add 1 capsule of dissolved culture for every 10 litres of milk. Cover the pot with a lid.
Let the milk rest for 10 -15 minutes. This lets the bacteria multiply.
2. COAGULATION: Add 2,5-2,7 ml of natural rennet for every 10 litres of milk. Let it rest under a lid for 45 minutes.
3. CUTTING THE CURD: Cut the coagulated milk to 4-4 cm curds, then wait 4-5 minutes, so the whey starts releasing.
Cut the curds further to about 2 cm.
4. SEDIMENTATION: Let things settle for 20-25 minutes, gently mix 3-4 times so the curds won't stick together.
Save some the whey, it will be used later.
5. SHAPING: When the curds settled at the bottom, remove the excess whey from the top.
Put the curds into a cheese mould, preferably rectangular (for even slices), and let it drip for half an hour under its own weight.
Gently flip it. The curd is very soft at this point, so be careful.
Every flip will get easier and easier.
After another half hour flip the cheese again, then after an hour, then again 4-5 times. This process takes 20-24 hours altogether.
Do it in a 20-23 °C room.
6. SALTING: Make a 12% (by weight) brine out of the whey. 120 g salt and as much whey that makes the brine 1000 g altogether.
Cut the cheese to thick slices, and put it in a closable glass container.
Pour brine into the jar, until all of the cheeses are fully submerged.
7. AGEING: Covered, in glass, at 10-12°C, for 4-6 weeks.
8. STORAGE: Store it in a refrigerator, in its brine.
You can take out of it without spoiling the rest, the only thing you have to pay attention to, is to keep the cheeses submerged.
Happy cheesemaking! :D
