My husband was able to bring food and water to the cats this morning. He found the heated water bowl had been knocked over again, even with the improved set up. Which means, of course, it is unplugged again. It’s just too close to the entrance of the cats’ house.
When I headed out later and went to put bird seed out, I found this handsome bird watching me!
Tuxedo Mask has such owl eyes, too! :-D
It’s rare, but he does sometimes let us touch him. More often, if I hold my hand out for him to sniff, he tentatively bats at it, instead. :-D This morning, however, I had a lovely surprise. Chadicous (I think) kept flopping onto the snow in front of my feet while I was trying to move around, pausing to pet Agnoos and Nutmeg. I’d reach out to Chadicous and he’d move away a few inches, before flopping on the ground again.
Then I got him!
Before he had a chance to move, I was able to start skritching his ears. Not only did he stay and let me keep skritching for a while, but he was actually purring!!!
Yes, progress!
As I continued my rounds, I went into the garage and did some digging. I found the extension cords we use to plug in our van, and the old one that used to be inside my mother’s car, to plug in the block heater, battery warmer and trickle charger, set up under the hood. Her old one got replaced because it was damaged, but I half remembered having an extra.
I was right. Not only did we have an extra cord that was only 8 ft long (still longer than I need, but better than the next size up we have, which is 30 feet!), but I could see no damage to it at all. I brought it to the house and asked my husband to check it for me while I finished my rounds, and he tested it out, too. It’s one of those that has a light in the female end to show if there is power on or not. It is in perfect working order, and has no damage.
Which means we have a suitable, safe extension cord we can set up inside the cats’ house, long enough that I can run it along the frame, away from the straw bedding and any gnawing teeth, up to the entry. We will then be able to reach the plug through the opening, instead of having to lift the roof every time. When my daughter and I opened the cat house to plug in the water bowl yesterday, I discovered it moving away from the wall near the hinge on one side. That roof is very heavy, and the shelter is pretty old. One of the pieces of wood in the frame had split, right near the corner. After we were done, I added a couple of screws from the outside to stabilize it. When we open it again today, I’ll give it another look and see if I should add more.
Once that’s done, we will no longer have to keep the heated water bowl so close to the entry, and can have it directly the ground.
Well, here it is! The final product in trying to make my mother’s baking soda cheese.
Did it work?
Well… sort of.
First of all, this is not at all like what I remember my mother’s cheese looked like. That was a semi-hard cheese that could be sliced. This… is not. It’s more like a cream cheese in texture, but it wants to crumble more than spread. It can, however, be spread.
As for the taste… I have a really hard time describing it. It’s a young cheese so, of course, the flavour is very mild. Which means it would lend itself very well to the addition of herbs and spices and other flavours. As it is now, with just salt, there is a sort of tanginess to it that I can’t put my finger on. It somehow manages to be both mild and bold tasting, at the same time!
All four of us have had a taste, and we do have a consensus.
It’s very good. Delicious, even.
In fact, as I write this, I’m enjoying it on a slice of oatmeal bread, with a cup of Irish Breakfast tea.
What I should probably do is take some to my mother, so she can try it and tell me how it compares to what she made. After all, I only ever saw the finished product once, and that was many years ago. Based on my memory of it, I did not succeed in recreating it. However, the finished product is very good.
With the cost of milk these days, compared to a container of Boursin cheese at the grocery store, we’re not really saving any money by making it ourselves. If I were to compare to the cost of a block of plain cream cheese, we’d be losing money by making it ourselves.
Is it worth making again?
Absolutely. And we will, probably in larger quantities.
It may not be as I remember my mother’s soda cheese looked like (I can’t compare the taste too much, since hers had been flavoured with caraway seeds), but that’s just more reason to keep trying!
The Overview
Okay, so let’s look at why it might not have turned out like my mothers. What differences were there?
First up, quantity of milk. I’m now convinced that my original notes, which said “about 5 gallons” of milk was accurate. My parents still had a few cows at the time I visited and saw this cheese, and it was just the two of them, so they would have had a LOT of excess milk.
Second, she used raw, skim milk. My parents always ran the milk through the separator. While I’m sure they must have done it once in a while, I don’t remember my parents ever setting aside whole milk. Until it finally closed, my parents sold their cream to a local creamery for a bit of extra cash (though they sometimes took payment in butter!). Skim milk was for home use. Cream was for selling. I used the type of milk we usually buy; homo milk (3%). We never, ever buy skim, because we all find it incredibly disgusting. So what I made has a higher fat content than hers would have, plus our milk was pasteurized and homogenized. Hers would not have been.
Other differences include my hanging the cheese to drain, when my mother had just set it aside; my curds may have been drier than hers. She melted her curds in a frying pan before pouring it into a mold. Chances are, the frying pan she used was cast iron. If so, that too would have made a difference. She would have made hers in the summer, when the milk would have soured much more quickly. Even the natural yeasts in the air might have made a difference, and while my mother would have ensured everything was clean, she could not have sanitized things to the extent that home cheese makers can, now. The salt I used also would have been different. She would have used ordinary table salt, which would be iodized. I used non-iodized coarse salt that had been run through a coffee grinder to powder it.
There’s also the fact that she may not even remember some details, or had not thought to mention some because, to her, they were just so obvious she couldn’t imagine them not being done.
There are so many little things that could have made a difference, but until I actually take some to my mother to try, I don’t even know just how different ours is from hers! For all I know, I could be remembering her cheese completely wrong, or the cheese I remember is not the one she remembered and gave me her instructions for. We could have been talking about two different cheeses completely, and not known it.
I guess that’s just how it can be. I’ve had an interest in recreating ancient recipes for many, many years, and this sort of reminds me of that. When the ancient recipes were written down, they weren’t at all like modern recipes. Often, they were little more than a list of ingredients, with no or few quantities. The writer assumed the reader would already know the details. My mother just used what she had, in the quantities she had, done in the ways she knew.
I’m just fortunate I can still actually ask her for details, even if she can’t always remember them.
There’s always a little something, when I do my morning rounds! :-D
My husband had been able to take care of the cats earlier, so when I got out, I just have to put out feed for the birds (and deer). By the time I came out, however, I found the new heated water bowl had been knocked over. There had to have been some sort of altercation at the entry of the cats’ house, because even the brick supports around it had gone flying, and the power cord to the bowl had been pulled out.
Not only was the new bowl empty, but the water in the other bowls was frozen solid!
Something better had to be found.
I quickly went to feed the birds, thinking about it, and noticed the chimney liners along the side of the house. Since cleaning up the pile behind the house, we’ve been using these to hold the insulation that gets put around the house every winter.
They were just the right size and shape. Was there one we could spare?
Not on that side of the house, so I came back around and looked at the ones along the back of the house. We have other things set up against the house to help keep the insulation from being blown away, so I was able to find one that looked like we could spare.
It’s the perfect size and shape!
The bowl is so big, I added bricks as spacers between it and the shelter. The cats immediately were all over it, until I refilled the other water bowls, too. They were very thirsty!
We will have to plug the bowl back in later, once there are two people available. With the snow accumulation, the counterweight doesn’t quite reach the ground, so one person has to hold up the roof while the other does what needs to be done, inside. When we do our monthly shop, we’ll pick up a short, appropriate extension cord that can be safely used, so we can at least not have to worry about the cord being unplugged. Not too short, though. I want to run it along the frame of the shelter, just under the roof, so there will be no issue with the cats knocking it about, and no critters chewing on it.
Thanks to my daughter digging out more paths, I was able to get at the back of the garage and the outhouse. To clear access to the outhouse, my daughter had to break up that fallen piece of tree. It was warm enough to no longer be quite frozen to the ground, but that’s as far as it’s going to be moved until, most likely, spring.
When switching out the memory card in the trail cam by the new sign, I noticed these tracks. Something had walked towards the corner, stopped, then turned around. At first, I thought they were foot prints, they were so big. That didn’t seem likely, given the piles of snow from the plow. Not even our vandal is that dedicated to causing problems! The question was, did whatever made it go far enough to trigger the motion sensor on the trail cam?
The answer is, yes!
Would you look at that majestic beauty!!
While doing my rounds and seeing deer tracks, I had been noticing some hoof prints much larger than the others. I’d say, we’ve captured the beast that made them! And what a handsome fella he is!
I’m pretty sure we’ve been seeing this same buck visiting our place since we moved here. If it is, this would be the fifth winter of visits from him. :-)
After sitting overnight, tucked away in the oven, it was time to take out the cheese and do the final steps.
This is what it looks like this morning, after stirring.
It… looks like dry cottage cheese.
The next instructions were:
Add salt to taste, if desired. Add colour if desired. Add herbs/spices, if desired.
For this first attempt, I am only adding salt.
If you look closely, you can see the salt on the curds in front of the spoon. My mother would have just plain table salt, since that’s what she would have had. I stole some of the powdered salt my daughters use in the popcorn pot. It’s just coarse salt that has been run through a coffee grinder, so it can be added to the oil that popcorn is popped in, and actually stick to the popcorn as it pops. That got very thoroughly mixed in while I started the next step.
Put to frying pan on low heat, in batches, and heat. Mix while heating.
The more the curd got mixed, the more dough-like it got in consistency.
Then, it actually started to melt!
I know that’s what my mother said, but I still felt surprised by it!
I even had to change spoons. By this stage, the texture was a bit like cake batter.
When melted completely, pour into form.
I didn’t know how long it needed to be stirred, but my mom said to pour it, so I just kept going.
Just look at this! It really did get to a pour-able consistency, unlike any other cheese I’ve ever worked with! At this stage, it was like well stirred sour cream in consistency.
I then poured it into a loaf pan I’d scalded and had ready. This level if what 1 gallon of milk was reduced to.
Leave to rest until cool. When cool, ready to slice.
This is the stage we are at now. I covered the loaf pan with a narrow wooden cutting board I have. I considered covering it with plastic wrap, but I wasn’t sure I wanted the condensation build up, and the board would keep the dust off while also allowing a bit of air.
I’m hoping that, as it cools, it shrinks a bit, so it’ll be easier to remove from the loaf pan.
I did taste it after pouring it into the mold (I admit it. I licked the spoon!). The salt definitely improves the otherwise bland flavour. There is another flavour in there that I just can’t identify or describe. I’m hoping after we do a taste test, later, someone in the household will be able to describe it!
First of all, I’m happy to say the new heated water bowl is working out just fine!
The power cord is slightly shorter than the old one. It specifically stated on one of the labels to not use extension cords with it, and there are no other outdoor power outlets we can use here, so we had to get creative. The bowl is not on a makeshift platform to support it. That made it too high for the cats to reach the water from outside the cats’ house, but a couple of buckets and bricks now serve as surfaces that cats can use to sit on – while also providing stability to keep the bowl from getting knocked over as the cats go in and out of their house.
The cats where checking it out and using it almost immediately! :-)
Including this roly poly Potato, who followed me when I started my rounds. :-D
There were quite a lot of deer tracks around, but this was new this morning.
The dug up the pile of dried up bush beans that had been cleared out and set aside, to eat. These were waiting to be buried in the beds in the spring, but there might not be any left by then!
Today was pretty warm, so I took advantage of it to do a small burn. While tending the burn barrel, looking at the nearby deer tracks in the snow, I found myself trying to figure out another set of tracks.
It looks like a pair of animals leaped their way through the snow! Fairly recently, too. They are very fresh, and were made after the deer had gone by. I have no idea what would have done this. The holes left in the snow are not that big, but the space between them is pretty huge! Looking at the holes nearest where I was, I couldn’t see any prints inside them, as the snow had collapsed inward as the creatures leapt about.
Any hunters or trackers out there who might know what made these?
After the burn was done, I also took advantage of the relative warmth and broke out the ice chipper.
Then I finally got to shovel the main paths wide enough that my husband can get through with his walker.
Then, because I’m a suck, I shoveled the path along the garden bed that cats had been using. :-D It’s not wide enough for a walk, but if my husband ever needed to, he can at least cane it through here.
After I came inside, the girls went out and cleared paths to the compost pile, outhouse and the back door of the garage.
Eventually, we’ll clear enough of the yard that we can drive in to unload the van, but that will be a job for our little electric snow blower. :-)
All that done, I then worked on the cheese I’ve been making, which was really interesting. That will be in my next post! :-)
Okay, so the curds have been hanging for about 5 1/2 hours, and I’ve moved on to the next steps in trying to recreate my mom’s cheese.
Now, my Mom had said to just set it aside for a few hours, or overnight, so hanging it may have changed things a bit. I don’t know. But this is what it looks like after hanging for most of the day.
Also, it’s a good thing I covered the whole set up with another cheesecloth, because the cats REALLY wanted to get at this!
The next instructions are:
Put solids into large pot. Add about 1 tsp baking soda and mix thoroughly. Leave overnight. Will rise like bread.
Hmmm.
Looking at how little there is in here, I’m starting to think that my original notes, saying about 5 gallons of milk, was accurate. There is not a lot in here, and when I saw my mother’s cheese, it filled an ice cream bucket, so there’s no way it was only 1 gallon.
Which means I’ve been using the quantities for vinegar and baking soda for 5 gallons, not 1 gallon. Yet, 1 tsp of vinegar to sour 5 gallons seems like way too little. Mind you, she would have been making this in the summer, and the milk probably would have soured quickly, with no vinegar at all. Knowing she was pretty loosey-goosey on the quantities to begin with, it’s really hard to know. Considering how long it took to sour using 1 tsp of vinegar to 1 gallon of milk, I suspect it’s actually the correct amount, and that I would have needed more, if I were using more milk.
This is after very thoroughly mixing in the baking soda. Yes, I used 1 tsp for this amount.
The curds feel like a cross between cream cheese and cottage cheese. I spent quite a bit of time mixing it, because I wanted that baking soda to be worked in as much as possible.
My mom said to leave it overnight, which means she would have just left it on a counter, but I have put the covered pot into a warm oven, because of how chilly that part of the house gets.
She commented that it will “rise like bread.” That makes sense, since we should be seeing a chemical reaction between the acidic milk soured with vinegar, and the alkaline baking soda. It’s something I’m used to when working with sourdough, but with cheese? I did get the sense that the curds were starting to feel “fluffier” by the time I finished stirring in the soda, but that could be just my imagination because I am expecting something like that.
I did taste the curds before and after adding the soda. As I mentioned before, it has very little flavour right now, but I did feel that the baking soda … softened… the flavour, if that makes sense.
After it has sat for the night, salt, colours and herbs and spices can be added. For this first attempt, I will be adding some salt, but that’s it. If we make it again, we’ll experiment with adding herbs and spices or whatever.
I am incredibly curious to see what it looks like by morning!
Growing up here, as a subsistence farm, we had cows for milking and for beef. Even with 7 of us, we were milking enough cows to have excess milk. I remember my mother making cottage cheese (which I did NOT like), but that was the only type of cheese I saw her make until some years after I’d moved off the farm. I’d come out to visit, and saw some semi-hard cheese in an old ice cream bucket for a form. It was slightly harder than a cheddar, sort of tannish yellow in colour, with caraway seeds in it. It was quite tasty. I asked my mother about it, and she said she had made it.
A few years ago, I asked my mother about how she made this cheese I remembered. Unfortunately, she thought I was talking about cottage cheese, and the more I described it, the more perplexed she was.
After moving here, I was having a conversation with my mother about making and preserving food, when she mentioned a cheese she’d made. It was the one I remembered! I quickly took advantage of the moment, and got her to describe to me how she made it. I knew it had to be different, because my mother did not have access to rennet or any of the bacterial starters. She didn’t have a food thermometer, either.
Getting any sort of information like this from my mother has always been difficult. I remember the first time I tried to get a recipe for a soup she made. I remembered some of the ingredients, and asked her if she remembered how she made it. Instead of answering me, she started mocking me for not knowing how to cook and not knowing how to make soup. Never mind that I was already married and a child, by then, and had been feeding the family just fine.
I never did find out how she made that soup.
This time, I did manage to get the information down then, after I got off the phone with her, re-wrote it into more cohesive instructions, since the conversation bounced all over the place. When I was finally ready to try it, I was perplexed by some of the quantities, so I called her to clarify. Did she really start with 5 gallons of milk, or did I make a mistake writing it down?
Finding out was like pulling teeth! She kept avoiding answering the question, and kept saying, “you mean you’ve never made cheese before?” in total shock. Then giving me instructions on how to do different parts. I kept going back to the quantity, and asked her if she had used 5 gallons, only to be told how I should just use one gallon, because 5 gallons is such a lot… *facepalm* Then she talked about how she’d never made it using milk from a store, and how I could use lemon juice instead of vinegar, and on and on. It took a while, but I managed to explain that I have made cheese before, I did only want to use 1 gallon, and if the instructions I had was for 5 gallons, I’d have to know that, so I could adjust the other quantities.
What it came down to is, my mother never measured. She used whatever amount of milk she had, and went from there. I did know that. What I needed was some sort of approximation, because there is a heck of a big difference in quantities involved.
Finally, she told me she used about 1 gallon.
*sigh*
Once I had that clarified, I finally got a batch started. Here are the instructions I got from her, highlighted in blue, with my own commentary.
Milk – about a gallon Add 1 tsp vinegar to make sour. May take all night.
This part actually ended up taking almost two days. The milk was supposed to rest at room temperature, but with how cold our house is – especially the kitchen – I put it in a warm oven.
When sour, put in pot/roaster into oven to warm (lowest heat) until forms curds and whey.
We finally reached that stage this morning.
This is how it looked.
I have no idea if this is how it’s supposed to look.
Drain through cheesecloth.
There is nothing about cutting the curds or anything like that, first. Just to drain it.
I did give it a taste at this point. It doesn’t have much flavour to speak of. The texture was a lot denser than I expected it to be, considering how it broke apart.
Set aside for a few hours or, preferable, overnight.
This is the stage we’re at now, though I’m cheating a bit. I dug out the stand I made to hang jelly bags or drain yogurt cheese, tied off the cheesecloth and hung it.
After taking this photo, I covered the whole stand and bowl with another cheesecloth, to keep out the dust and cat fur – and cats!
Since I got to this point so early in the day, I will likely continue after a few hours, rather than leaving it overnight, because…
Put solids into large pot. Add about 1 tsp baking soda and mix thoroughly. Leave overnight. Will rise like bread.
… it will sit overnight again, after this stage.
As for the whey, I think it’s time to do some more bread baking! I love using whey as the liquid. It adds so much flavour!
The next instructions have me wondering.
Add salt to taste, if desired. Add colour if desired. Add herbs/spices, if desired.
This is all stuff that’s supposed to be added after the baking soda gets added, and after it rests overnight. Which seems odd to me, but that’s how she did it, so that’s how I’ll try it!
Put to frying pan on low heat, in batches, and heat. Mix while heating. When melted completely, pour into form.
… melted?
It can melt at this stage?
I am really perplexed by this.
I’m not sure what I’ll use as a form just yet. It will depend on what I see when the time comes
Leave to rest until cool. When cool, ready to slice.
If I hadn’t see my mother’s cheese, I would never guess that these instructions would get that result. As it is, I am still unsure of what I’ll actually get!
So this should be an interesting experiment. I hope it works, because it’s really easy to make, even if it does get spread out over several days.
Since the blizzard hit, I’ve been trying to get a head count on the outside cats, every chance I get. That we were consistently seeing “only” 17 or 18 at once had me concerned about the missing ones, but with how much they mill about, I couldn’t even tell which ones were missing!
Well, this morning, I am much relieved.
After topping up their kibble trays, I counted 17 again. Then another one showed up after they got their warm water. Finally, I saw Ghost Baby ghosting her way across the yard and disappearing behind the kibble house, for 19. Awesome! Just short one fur baby.
Then, as I started down the driveway, Rosencrantz emerged from under the garage door. Twenty!! Yes! For the first time since the blizzard, all 20 outside cats, including the Distinguished Guest, are all accounted for!
I am happy.
When checking the gate, I could see that the road was plowed, so I headed out to get the mail. There, I found an awesome surprise!
A dear, awesome, fabulous friend sent us a replacement heated water bowl – and that thing is HUGE!!!
One and a half gallon capacity! Thermostatically controlled, too, so it won’t stay on constantly.
Thank you, my awesome friend! You’re the best!
Later today, I’ll snag a daughter to wrestle the cats’ house roof open so we can plug it in and set it up.
The cats are going to really love having enough warm water to last all of them, all day!!
I just had to giggle at the fresh cat path, long the ridges left behind when the driveway was cleared. So many paw prints. Probably made during the rush to the kibble house, when my husband came out with food, this morning! We had blowing snow all night, so these are definitely recent tracks.
The cats aren’t the only critters who appreciate the driveway being cleared, and the paths we’ve made! Along the driveway, I could see deer tracks showing where they jumped fences, then used the driveway before jumping the gate.
The cats are handling the snow very well. They all have their dense winter fur. That’s a relief. Fenrir became an inside cat because she doesn’t have the undercoat, and would not have survived her first winter, if we hadn’t brought her in. I don’t know where she came from, but our local stock are well adapted to the cold!
They are definitely eating more, now. Though I husband had fed them not long before I headed out, I still ended up topping up some of the kibble trays. Which is good. They need those calories!
Agnoos was more interested in trying to trip me up! :-D
I’m not completely sure which of the ‘icouses this one is. Thadicous, most likely.
He was having a blast, rolling around in the snow!
We ended up having a storm blow through last night. I was keeping an eye on the garage cam live feed, and it was frequently blinded by snow. Over the hours, I saw the snow ridges on the sides of the driveway slowly disappear, so I had some trepidation as I came out this morning. Thankfully, it was just due to blowing snow that drifted against them, making everything look level in the infrared light. We won’t even need to shovel! I also kept an ear out on road conditions, and lots of people were reporting them as being very dangerous, due to ice and blowing snow. The temperature reached a low of only -4C/25F, and we’re still at that temperature as I write this. My weather apps had the wind chill last night at -15C/5F, but I have no doubt it felt a lot colder at times.
This morning, I dug out a waterproof cord protector and plugged in the cats’ house, even though temperatures are still relatively mild. It was more about still having access through the snow. The timer the heat bulb is plugged into is set to operate from dawn to dusk. As long as there is enough light coming in through the window, it won’t turn on. Which means we won’t have visual confirmation that it’s working until it’s dark, and we can see the red on indicator light through the window. The girls did check it when they cleaned the cats’ house out, so it should be fine.
While doing my rounds, I could hear the sound of heavy equipment, so the roads are being worked on. Mostly, they need to be sanded, but that won’t get done until any drifting gets cleared, first. The main road that goes past us gets cleared quickly, but side roads like the one past our driveway might not get done until tomorrow, depending on how quickly they can do the main roads. Thankfully, things are supposed to stay calm and relatively mild for the next couple of weeks. I don’t mind the snow, though. Any snow we get will go a long way to helping restore the level of our water table, after this past summer’s drought. The Old Farmer’s Almanac predicted a mild wet winter for our region, and I do hope they are right! We really need the break from the bitter cold of the past two winters, in particular. It may make getting around harder, but snow is a good thing.
We used a house brand, cranberry raspberry cocktail for the base, which also contained other types of juice in it. The predominant flavour was actually apple.
The juice and ginger bug mixture stayed at room temperature in a plastic bottle for a week. Every day, we would give the bottle a squeeze to see if it was getting harder, which would show that fermentation was happening and gases were starting to expand. Then one morning, I walked past and saw the bottle looking like it was about to tip over! The bottle was rock hard, and the indented base had been pushed outwards under the pressure, causing it start tipping!
I immediately put it in the fridge to stop the fermentation process, but not before I opened the bottle enough to relieve some of the pressure!
When we taste tested it the next day, there was quite a bit of pressure release when I opened the jug, but in pouring it out, there was surprisingly little fizz. It’s more like a barely noticeable effervescence, with a light tingle on the tongue.
Honestly, it really just tastes like juice. None of us noticed much of a ginger flavour in there, and the predominant flavour is still apple. I found it very sweet, so when I had another glass the next day, I watered it down, about 50/50. I found it to be nicer that way.
In researching how to make this, one of the things I’d read was that, after moving it to the fridge, it needed to be drunk within a few weeks, because it loses its fizz. So far, that has not been true! Every time I’ve taken the bottle out, it’s been rock hard again, and there’s no lessening on the sound of gas being released when it’s opened!
As for the glass in the photo, I admit, this is an adulterated drink. I poured it over quite a bit of ice, rather than watering it down.
The ginger bug drink is very sweet, while the hard crab apple cider is a bit on the sour side, and the two balance each other out quite nicely.
I now have a new bottle of cranberry raspberry cocktail mixed with the ginger bug starter. That’s the last of the juice I got for this. I think next time, we’ll try making a fruit syrup out of what we’ve got in the freezer and see how that works out!
The Re-Farmer 