Farmer's Cheese (творог)

I recently stumbled across a recipe for syrniki. They are essentially mini pan-fried breakfast cheesecakes. They're one of those simple recipes that relies on getting all the details just right. You only need cheese, eggs, sugar, flour, and a bit of vanilla to make them, but too much moisture or too much flour will throw the consistency off and result in cakes that either fall apart or end up distressingly chewey and tough.

One of the things that makes this recipe so tricky is that different cheeses will have different moisture contents and it can be difficult to get the moisture just right. Cheeses with stabilizers added can't really be drained to reduce the moisture either, so adjusting it to the necessary level can be nearly impossible. One YouTuber's solution to this is to make her own cheese. This way you can control the exact consistency and moisture content. Although it does add a bit more time and effort.

This was my first time culturing a cheese with kefir. Most of the cultured cheeses I've made have been inoculated with either buttermilk or yogurt depending on whether I was looking for a mesophilic or thermophilic culture. For a few I've used commercial cheesemaking cultures. Helen (the YouTuber who posted the recipe) recommends using kefir + whole milk and then incubating it at ~30°C for 9 hours. I was happy with the results this produced, but I'd be curious to try it with either a longer incubation time or a higher temperature. I felt like the curd wasn't quite as firm as it should have been. And, given that a lot of the cultures in the kefir I had were thermophilic, I feel like incubating it at 30°C might have been sub-optimal. The low-temperature method certainly works. I just wonder if a higher temperature might have given a slightly better result.

Farmer's Cheese

Slightly adapted from Helen Rennie

Ingredients

• 2L whole (3.25%) milk
• 2 c. plain kefir

Directions

1. Shake the kefir and stir it into the milk.
2. Incubate at 30°C (90°F) for 9-12 hours¹. (And InstantPot works well for this. You can use the yogurt setting.)
3. Once the milk has thickened and formed a soft curd, preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F).
4. Cover and bake at 180°C (350°F) for 50-60 minutes.
5. Line a colander with 3-4 layers of cheesecloth or one layer of butter muslin and drain the curds.
6. Lightly cover the draining curds so the surface doesn't dry out and allow them to continue draining overnight.
7. By the next morning, your cheese should be ready to use!

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¹ I actually think that 45°C (113°F) would be a better incubation temperature for this cheese, but I'm not sure how long it would need at that temperature. I'd guess around 4-6 hours, but I'd need to try it once or twice to dail in the timing. If I were doing this at the lower temperature 30°C incubation again, I'd probably leave it for the full 12 hours. Nine hours was okay, but I think it could've used more time. ^Back

I've made my own cheese before -- several different kinds, in fact -- but I've never done homemade yogurt. With cheeses it can sometimes be difficult to find a really good cheese of the variety you want. Or the labeling is too vague for you to really be able to tell what it's gonna be like. So making your own can provide some clear benefits. With yogurt, the labeling generally provides ample information and I'm really spoiled for choice on types and flavours. All that being said, I figured it'd be nice to try making some yogurt because it's one of the quicker and easier cultured dairy products to make. And also, from a somewhat completionist standpoint, it'd be nice to say that I've done it.

Yogurt

From the Home Creamery by Kathy Farrell-Kingsley

Ingredients

• 1L whole (3.25%) milk
• 1/4 c. plain yogurt¹

Directions

1. Heat milk to 85°C (185°F).
2. Allow to cool to between 40 and 46°C (105-115°F)².
3. Whisk in yogurt.
4. Hold at 43°C (110°F) for 6-12 hours. (I like to pour it into Mason jars before incubating. Volume will be slightly more than 1L due to added yogurt so use three 500mL jars.)
5. Transfer to fridge. Yogurt should keep for ~2 weeks.

Tips:

• For milder yogurt, use less starter (only 2-3 Tbsp.) and incubate only 6 hours. For tangier yogurt, use the full 1/4 c. of starter and incubate 12 hours.
• Some whey may separate out. It may be poured off or stirred in. Stirring in will result in thinner yogurt.
• To make thicker yogurt, stir 1/3 c. dry milk powder into milk before heating.
• For even thicker yogurt, sprinkle 1 tsp. unflavoured gelatine over milk after stirring in milk powder.

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Variations

Greek Yogurt

Ingredients

• 1L whole (3.25%) milk
• 1/4 c. plain yogurt

Directions

1. Make yogurt as above.
2. Line a fine mesh strainer with a double layer of cheesecloth (or a single layer of butter muslin) and set over a large mixing bowl or pot.
3. Once yogurt has finished incubating, pour into lined strainer and let drain overnight.
4. Transfer yogurt back to jar (or storage container of choice) and refrigerate.

Vanilla Yogurt

Ingredients

• 1L whole (3.25%) milk
• 1/4 c. plain yogurt
• 2-4 Tbsp. honey
• 1-2 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions

1. Make yogurt or Greek yogurt as you prefer.
2. Stir in honey and vanilla. If your honey has a very strong flavour use only 1-2 Tbsp. and, if it's still not sweet enough, add 1-2 Tbsp. of sugar instead of more honey.

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¹ Make sure that the yogurt you're using as a starter has live cultures. Also be sure that it doesn't have any sweeteners, flavourings, or gelatin. ^Back
2 The author says that it should only take 5 minutes for the milk to cool down to an appropriate temperature, but mine took ~30 minutes! ^Back

I still haven't ordered the rest of my cheese making supplies yet, so I have to stick to things that don't need rennet (or CaCl₂ or molds or any of that fancy stuff). If nothing else, holding off on placing the order forces me to stick to the basics and do the simpler stuff before moving on to the more intricate recipes.

I know crème fraîche isn't actually a type of cheese, but it is a cultured dairy product, so it feels like part of the same family in my mind. And it was fun to get to play around with cultures again after the more-or-less instant direct acidified cheeses. And it looks like it came out beautifully! I haven't actually tasted it yet, but if appearance is anything to go by breakfast is going to be a real treat tomorrow. I can't wait!

Update: So I've now had a chance to try the crème fraîche and it is just as delicious as it looks! (See above.) It is rich and smooth and creamy with just a tiny hint of tartness. If I'm completely honest, I think it could actually stand to be a bit tangier, but it's perfectly tasty the way it is. I might try either letting stand out at room temp slightly longer next time or using a different culture. I'll be sure to write up another post detailing the results if I do!

Crème Fraîche

Ingredients

• 1L heavy (35%) cream
• 1/4 tsp. Biena mesophilic aromatic type B culture¹

Directions

1. Thoroughly wash and/or sterilize all tools and containers. (I used a pressure cooker to achieve this.)
2. Gently warm cream to 30°C.²
3. Sprinkle the culture onto the surface of the cream and allow to stand for 2 minutes.
4. Thoroughly stir culture into cream, partially cover, and allow to stand at room temperature overnight. (Mine was out for somewhere around 12 or 13 hours.)
5. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
6. Crème fraiche may be used at this point or kept in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.

Feel free to use whatever mesophilic culture you prefer when making your own crème fraîche. You can even use a few Tbsp. of buttermilk in a pinch! Each one will produce its own characteristic flavour. I chose Aroma B for this because, based on some quick Googling around, it seemed like it was probably closest to the canonical crème fraîche culture.

Some Tips on Using Crème Fraîche

Crème fraîche is actually pretty awesome. It is a cultured dairy product similar to sour cream and can be used pretty much anywhere you'd use sour cream. People don't usually tend to substitute it because sour cream tends to be cheaper and more readily available whereas crème fraîche is more of a "specialty" ingredient so it tends to get reserved for the cases where only crème fraîche will do. That said, if you've made or bought a bunch and have some left over, it makes a fine stand-in for sour cream.

Better yet, crème fraîche is much more heat tolerant than sour cream. If you try to cook with sour cream, unless you stir it in right at the end (as with stroganoff), it will tend to break and curdle. Crème fraîche has a much higher fat content, so it won't curdle nearly so easily. If you want a cultured cream that will stand up to prolonged cooking and/or reheating then crème fraîche is where it's at!

It also whips! It does start out as heavy (aka "whipping") cream after all. Culturing it breaks down the lactose, making it less sweet and more acidic/"tangy", but it doesn't break down any of that glorious fat (which is why it stands up to heat so well). That high fat content is also what makes it whip-able. So you can have delicious, tangy, fluffy, whipped crème fraîche! How awesome is that?

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¹ Aroma B is a blend of Lactococcus lactis subsp. cremoris, Lactococcus lactis subsp. lactis, Lactococcus lactis subsp. diacetylactis, and Leuconostoc mesenteroides subsp. mesenteroides.<sup>Back

2</sup> I chose to pour my cream into a large Mason jar and heat it up in a warm water bath. This does make it more difficult to stir, but it meant that I could do everything directly in the jar and didn't have to worry about transferring it to the jar later. And the warm water bath ensures gentle, even heat.^Back