Buttercup's Feta

I know, not the most focused picture...but sometimes you just have to snap fast!
We finally made cheese. We started with feta...and someday will try chevre. As long as you have a few days (mostly playing the waiting game) it's really not that hard to make. We save up the milk from Mama goat Buttercup, and then started in on the process. I was amazed at how much whey is leftover after you get the curd separated. Then I learned that ricotta is made mostly from the whey.
Here we are...separating the curds from the whey.
(By the way, the baking soda and vinegar you see in the background did not go into the cheese. We were making a volcano mixture for a science project in between the cheese making.)

The cheese before entering our home made cheese press. AFTER starting our cheese making process, I came to the part in the recipe where it said to pull out your cheese press. Cheese press? Yikes! Don't have one of those laying around. So I made my own cheese press. I never got a picture of it.

The finished product. Taste-wise, I thought it was a little too salty. I'm not sure if I put too much salt in the cheese, or if it was an overly salted brine that the cheese sits in while in the fridge. I'm guessing that making cheese is a trial and error sort of thing until you get it really good. I'll let you know if that ever happens.

Tomorrow we are having 2 gallons of our friend's cow's milk delivered. We have a field trip Thursday morning where a friend will teach us how to make mozzarella with our milk.