My parents gave me a Yogourmet yogurt maker for my birthday awhile ago. I had a few not-so-great batches of yogurt, and then recently thought I had figured it out because I made two or three perfect, creamy, delicious batches. Then I lost my touch. The last two batches have turned out badly, with the curds and whey completely separated, and the curds all crumbly. The texture has been all wrong.
So, I have an idea of what I did wrong, but I have to go get more milk at the grocery store before I can experiment further. However, there is a happy ending to the most recent batch of botched yogurt. I hated to just throw it out, so I got online to see if there was anything I could do with it. It turns out that if you drain the whey off the curds, TA DA! You've got cream cheese! And it just so happens that the yogurt maker came with a cheesecloth bag just for this purpose. I poured the whole mess into the cheesecloth bag last night, put it in a strainer to drain in the refrigerator, and this morning here's what I pulled out of the bag:
It looks, feels and tastes just like the Philly stuff. Actually, I take that back. It's better. So, I got all excited and thought to myself, "I'm going to have to go buy bagels tomorrow!!" Then Brian said, "Can you make homemade bagels?" I thought it would be really hard, but I found this link that made me think it might not be so bad. I tried it out, and voila!!
They're not as beautiful as the kind at the bakery, but they taste just as good, and I was so proud of myself! Homemade bagels and homemade cream cheese! Who would've known I could pull it off?
We sweetened some cream cheese, added coconut extract, and aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh. That was good stuff. I think we've found our new favorite food.
So, yeah, I've got to figure out what I'm doing wrong with the yogurt, but the good news is, every time I mess up a batch, I get cream cheese out of the deal!
Pretty cool.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Adventures in the Kitchen
Posted by Karene at 8:55 PM
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6 comments:
That looks really good! A good chef can make something better from their mistakes!
WOW, I am completely impressed!! I might have to look into getting one of those yogourmet things because I LOVE cream cheese. You'll have to give me all your recipes. You're awesome!
All I have to say is AWESOME! Wish I was there to enjoy your homemade goodies. I think I'll just let you take over in the kitchen when you come to visit :)
Wow! Impressive! Both the cream cheese and the bagels!
That's awesome that you made cream cheese out of the funky yogurt. I recently learned how to make yogurt (although a much more rinky-dinky way- After it's cooked I put the pot in a crock pot to keep it at the right temp. for it to turn into yogurt.) Anyways, the last batch I made was really strong so I've got to figure out how to make it with less bite. Also, the batch I made before then had lots of curds in it and I think it was because I heated the milk up to quickly. Do you sweeten your yogurt or eat it hardcore?
We usually sweeten it. I do have a few recipes that call for plain yogurt that I use it for sometimes, but when we eat it plain we sweeten and flavor it.
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