Fresh Ricotta

Making cheese is a simple pleasure, I love the quick and low tech method of curdling some milk with lemon juice and sitting down to a plate of fresh milky ricotta.

When we get into the more complex cheeses it is time to scrub up and enter 'the lab' as we call our processing space. We've learnt the hard way that a bit of laziness can ruin a batch of cheese so now it is clean, sterilise and scrub up for cheese.

Fleurieu Peninsula is renowned premium dairy country, and even our own backyard - now a sea of vines - was once a land of milk rather than wine. The block next door ran cows up until ten years ago. The region has historically had farm house cheeses that disappeared as farms grew and bulk milk sales became the norm. There are a few well known producers that have returned to making farm house cheeses and producing local milks that celebrate terroir.

The traditional Italian Ricotta, unique in that it is made from the whey that separates from curd during cheese-making. At Producers we make Ricotta using whole milk, this method is not unknown in Italy and we prefer the creamy result. As you would expect, the Milk makes all the difference in flavour and texture, we use our local milks: Alexandrina Cheese Company and Fleurieu Milk Company Jersey Milk for our cow’s milk Ricotta. For goat’s milk Ricotta and curd we source from milk from Hindmarsh Valley Dairy.

There are several methods of acidifying the milk to bring out the curd, we use a mixture of Lemon and White Wine Vinegar. Whole Milk Ricotta will give almost two kilos of cheese from 10 litres of milk.

Home Made Ricotta Method

Heat milk to 90 degrees C, stirring continually.
As the milk reaches temperature, take off heat and stir in acid (vinegar approximately 5% of milk volume, lemon juice around 10% of volume – experiment as it depends on the strength of your lemons and vinegar), the milk will coagulate.
Strain the curds for around five minutes.
Transfer the curd to a mixing bowl and blend in desired fat and flavouring, eg: salt, pepper, butter, cream or olive oil.

Try Sheep or Goat’s Milk for a tangier Ricotta. Every batch we make is different. If you take longer to heat the milk your curd will be softer. How often and how vigorously you stir the curd during cooking time will affect the size of curd formed, texture changes with vigour used when mixing in flavouring.

Irrisistible spread onto freshly baked crusty bread, serve with sliced tomatoes, bake the curd or add to cakes and tarts. A favourite of ours is to make a simple salad of parsley, shallots, olives mixed with a generous amount of robust olive oil served alongside Ricotta and toasted tomato bread. Very creamy Ricotta is perfect for making cakes and puddings, as well as a savoury filling for pasta. The leftover whey can also be used in recipes.

The whole point of Ricotta is freshness, we make it the day we want to eat it, but for use in recipes it is fine kept in the refrigerator covered with glad wrap or in sealed container for a couple of days, we don't keep it over four days.