Eating Our Curds & Whey

One of the most interesting things about milking Martha and Mellie is the correlation between what we feed them one day and the amount of milk that they produce the next.  Yesterday they got lots of high protein snacks: cauliflower plants, leftover apples and dairy goat grain in addition to the grass and weeds that they forage throughout the day and the hay in their feeder at night time.

This morning they produced milk like crazy!  I got over a litre of milk from each of them.  Thank goodness I am getting better at milking them and they are getting better at standing still or it would have taken me forever to milk them out.

I love that the goats are producing lots of delicious milk; however, it means that I need to start coming up with more creative ways to use it up.  We are definitely a milk drinking family but we do not use two litres a day!

All this to explain my need to delve into the realm of cheese making today.  Alistair and I decided to start with the easiest possible cheese - farmer's cheese.

All we needed was 4 cups of goat milk, the juice of two lemons (about 1/3 cup) and salt.  I heated up the milk to 185 F and then added the lemon juice.

Making cheese on the left, pasteurizing today's milk on the right.

I let it sit for 10 minutes for the curds to form, strained it through two layers of cheese cloth and let it drain for 1.5 hours.

Curds

Whey

I read that fresh chives go great in this type of cheese. 
I have those!

Fresh cheese with chives on homemade bread.
Beat that, I dare you!

I deemed our cheese making a success but I am no further ahead with a surplus of cheese than I am with a surplus of milk.  So, tonight's dinner criteria was that it needed to use up today's cheese.

With the help of the garden (which is still in really good shape for mid September) we created a cheesy vegetable pasta using: chard, spinach, parsley, beet greens, yellow tomatoes, zucchini and most importantly - our homemade chive goat milk cheese.

Frying up some sage leaves.

Crispy!

Well, I think it is safe to say that Alistair and I did it!  Liam and Seamus both ate huge bowls of our pasta dish after school and finished every morsel (including all the greens and veggies!).  What a super healthy meal straight from our farm to our table.  I love it!

Ali and Mama for the win!