The Cheese Testers

I'm in love!! A gallon of goat's milk makes a LOT of fresh tangy CHEVRE cheese, a perfect vehicle for some exotic flavors. I made little logs, just like the finest French imports, some rolled in fresh ground black pepper, some mixed with the fine zest of lemon, and the favorite with the punks so far: lemon zest and essential orange oil - the label is simply "citrus". My oh my! Spread a bit on some buttery crackers, and you are as close to heaven as mere mortals may get!

The fresh chevre, some rosemary/herbed ricotta, and a chunk of Farm cheese became a gourmet taste test by the punks. Chef J condescended to become a "Food Critic", with thumbs up for the Rosemary ricotta and Citrus chevre.

First you check the aroma...
test the consistency...

then let it drift across all the taste buds (which became an anatomy lesson, on where each type of taste bud resides on the tongue - remember that from health class??). Personally, I loved the plain fresh chevre - not goaty at all, as I've experienced from some of the imports, just clean, creamy, carrying a tang that is mysterious yet pleasing. This was my first "long process" cheese, where it was inoculated with a culture, sat for 15 hours, then drained in the frig for another 12 hours. It is so amazing, to have a hand in a creation process that results in such ambrosia.

Then the REAL critic stepped up to the plate. The Farm cheese was his choice - he even asked for more! That was without a cracker, too. Plain naked cheese!

I have a dozen small logs of chevre in the fridge - well, only nine, now, we continued the taste testing at the farmhouse so mom and dad could participate. Several friends have been waiting patiently for the chevre, so more will be going out for taste testing.

The sad news is, the lady who owns the goat I've been milking (she - the goat - was on loan to my neighbor for a few months) needs Sassy back, so she will soon be going home. We aren't using the milk from the second goat I've been milking, she has been on longterm antibiotics, which doesn't matter for feeding lambs, but not so great for cheese making.

I have only one more gallon to turn into chevre, that may be it for the season. I'm going to freeze a few of the precious little logs, with fingers crossed that the cheeses will be at least close to the fresh product upon thawing. They are going to have to last until next spring.

Sigh.