First off, I hate frozen milk. I know many people freeze their milk and they swear it's totally fine, but I think it's disgusting. I am of the opinion that it absolutely changes the texture and the flavor. But some might describe me as neurotically sensitive to such things, so use your own judgement.
Here's the other thing about frozen milk: if you're dealing with raw milk to start with, it never actually goes "bad", it just turns into other stuff, like sour milk and potential cheese. It's not like moldy bread, which you should throw out (yes, the whole loaf), or moldy cheese, which you can carve down to a non-moldy piece (don't throw the whole thing out). Raw milk just turns into sour milk, which is eternally useful. Pasteurized milk, on the other hand, gets kinda gross. It's still salvageable as cheese, but it's better not to let it go bad. So, if you think you have too much milk on your hands and you're opposed to freezing it like I am, make something with it ahead of time, like cheese, yogurt, sour cream, kefir, or ice cream.
Buttermilk. It's funny how buying things at the store removes us from knowing what those things actually are. Real buttermilk is actually the liquid leftovers from making butter. In other words, you take cream and beat it until you think your arm is going to fall off (a butter churn
is helpful) and then you get solid fats and liquid leftovers. The liquid leftovers are buttermilk. If you didn't salt your butter, the buttermilk will initially taste sweet, but it's one of those things that you either love or hate to drink. Either way, it goes sour very quickly. You should use it within a day or two. It's excellent for baking in lieu of water or milk in baked goods, or in lieu of water when cooking grains. **Note: If your raw milk is unhomogenized, you can let it sit in the fridge in a wide-mouth container for 24 hours and then skim the cream off the top, use it to make butter, and get buttermilk!Cheese. or Curds and Whey. The only cheese I know how to make is a sort of poor-man's ricotta/farmer's cheese. It's very simple. You heat the milk until an almost-simmer...just tiny bubbles coming to the top. Then turn off the heat, add a tablespoon or two of vinegar (I prefer apple cider, but it does impart its own flavor) or lemon juice, and stir. Sometimes the result is instantaneous, but other time it takes a while, and you may begin to wonder if anything is going to happen. Right about the time you're ready to give up, the curds will separate from the whey (that's right, this is where we get the expression "curds and whey"). You can then strain off the curds and do any manner of things with them...mix in herbs, press in cheese cloth (that's where paneer comes from). But whatever you do, that's your cheese, no further operations necessary. The leftover, sour, milky liquid is the whey. It can be used as a nutritional drink or in lieu of water when cooking grains.
Yogurt. You can actually make raw-milk raw-yogurt, just don't heat the milk above 110 degrees. Sally Falon
is the best source for going in-depth with this process, and other raw-milk uses. The only thing about raw-milk yogurt is that it doesn't make a good starter the next time around. So, if you want to keep your own starter instead of buying a new one, it might be best to reserve a small bit and pasteurize it for that purpose.Kefir. See "Fermentation Fervor" post from 12/18/09, and subsequent update.
Ice Cream. I'm waiting until winter's over. But raw milk makes the best ice cream.
Snow Cream. An old-time classic and the ultimate in local. The milk is fresh and raw, the snow falls directly out of the sky. You just blend milk and sugar and toss in enough snow for a thick consistency. Don't do this if you live in a polluted area.
Hot Chocolate. Okay, for most people chocolate is not local. But it's one of my three non-local vices, along with green superfoods and coffee/tea type beverages. Raw-milk chocolate is the most delicious.
Raw Honey Milk for Bedtime. Heat a cup of raw milk to just above "warm", then stir in a tablespoon of raw, local honey. Drink right before bedtime and sleep like a baby.
Would love to hear other suggestions from readers on what to do with raw milk!!!!
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You are awesome for writing this up -- I figured you'd be a pretty good expert. This helped me see what I was missing on all previous explanations of buttermilk...I thought it was the leftover milk (so, heterogenous milk with the cream taken out) which didn't make sense. Is the liquid remnant from butter-making thick like 'cultured buttermilk?' Do you know anything about acidity levels in buttermilk? A big thing in baking with buttermilk is that you can use baking soda instead of baking power (reacts with the acid in cultured buttermilk) and I wonder how that works out. I may conduct go get a ph kit and do some science experiments next week... Beware more questions!
ReplyDeleteHey Caitlin,
ReplyDeleteSo, as it turns out, the answer to both the question of culture and of acidity is multi-layered.
Cultured Buttermilk can be made by adding specific bacteria, as with yogurt.
Pre-culturing, fresh buttermilk is quite thin, but apparently if you allow the raw milk to separate on its own, outside the refrigerator, it begins to culture on its own, thus making the butter-churning process easier and making the resulting buttermilk thicker. So this is also cultured buttermilk, technically speaking.
Buttermilk has a ph of 4.5, according to the FDA, but I wonder whether they are talking about cultured or uncultured, raw or pasteurized, etc.
Oh yeah, one more thing....you can make cheese with buttermilk, too!
ReplyDeleteFollow the exact same process as with regular milk. You will simply get a smaller amount of cheese. The leftover will then be whey, not buttermilk.