Fresh mozzarella on homemade arepas - now that's good stuff!!! I pasteurize raw (goat's) milk when I occasionally use it (the dairy is 2-1/2-miles from where I live), and I would pasteurize all raw milk before using it because there are more kinds of bacteria, and more deadly bacteria, than existed even 20-years ago. There was a day we drank gallons of raw cow's milk growing up and I used a lot of raw goat's milk for fermenting. Today I wouldn't do it, especially after taking a food safety class through Kansas State University from Dr. Karen Penner - Ph.D.Extension Specialist, Food Science. But that's going to be a choice you get to make because you'll get cheese either way. ;-) For mozzarella I use powdered milk - which is a food storage staple at our house. That food storage cutie, "Chef Tess Bakeress" (she has her own web site), gives a great tutorial at the link below. I occasionally make curds with water, vinegar and powdered milk. Season them to make "cheese (no burger)" patties (plain, beef- or chicken-flavored). I use the recipe in Rita Bingham's "Natural Meals in Minutes". Other recipes from the book include: Quick Soft Pressed Cheese, Parmesan Cheese, Queso Blanco, Bag Cheese, Cottage Cheese and NO-Cook Cottage Cheese, Yellow Cheddar Cheese, Panir, Caraway Cheese, Jalapeno Cheese - and all the recipes are made with powdered milk. She uses non-instant powdered milk in the recipes. If all you have is instant powdered milk you simply run it through a blender to pulverize it to a fine powder, then you can measure it cup-for-cup for non-instant powdered milk. I think you'll be surprised how easy and fun it is! Have a great time. -Grainlady Here is a link that might be useful: How to Make American Mozzarella Cheese Out of Powdered Milk

YES! I do this all the time with Mesophilic yogurts, Viili or filmjolk, though. Room temperature yogurts can handle standing on the counter much longer, so you may need to play with the salt in you case. Not sure? If you use an incubator or a yogurt maker, you do not have a meso yogurt. First off, by making greek style yogurt, you saved yourself a ton of time. If your culture sets at room temp, perfect! If not, don't fret. You won't need an incubator and you do not need to cook and babysit. No brine either, just patience. To Do: add animal rennet and a little salt to your strained yogurt stir strain it some more in a t-shirt for about a day pack into a salted container and put in the fridge wait about 3 months to a few years. My oldest so far is 3 years and trust me, it is not a slicing cheese--more like an industrial coffee grinder! ha. Eat it up If you see mold at any point, it is fine. Pour off more liquid and add a little more salt in the container. The mold in my house that settles in my viili pot is a grayish color and adds a stronger flavor. It gives me two cheese flavors from the same yogurt. Mold is pretty nice (FREE) stuff when it lands in cheese. Personally, I'd die before I buy cheese molds. It is one more beautiful thing that makes home home, and your cheese unlike any other city's cheese. You breathe it in everyday, so it is already a small part of you. Take a deep breath, and make some cheese. (-;

I'm not familiar with dry cottage cheese, but I have the same trouble trying to find fresh hoop cheese nowadays. If the results of the "dry" cottage cheese making are too wet, you might consider pressing the cheese. You could also make a sieve frame with wood and mesh (or buy stretcher bars from an art supply, or even a premade screen printing screen), and prop it up over a big tray or pan so that you can spread your curds way out. If you can make this all fit in the fridge, so much the better, so you can drain and age the curds for a long time. If your fridge uses an evaporator to defrost itself, so much the better. :) You might also ask Jim at New England Cheesemaking Supply Company (cheesemaking.com). The recipe Sleevendog linked is adapted from them, but he might know more about getting it to be what you want.

Eileen, I just found this recipe on About.com, and it seems to yield 4 cups. Despite the warning, I may try this with 2% milk. Home-Made Ricotta From Cosa Bolle in Pentola, the Newsletter: Moving decisively towards food, Diana recently wrote: Though ricotta is often referred to as a cheese, if you want to split hairs it's actually a cheese byproduct, as it's made from the whey that is drained from the curds once the cheese is made. This doesn't mean one cannot make it from milk, however, and I occasionally get requests for a recipe. Gretl recently posted this to the FoodWine discussion list, and it does look good. The recipe is by Grace Pilato, and here are Gretl's transcription and notes: Homemade Fresh Ricotta (from Grace Pilato) I have worked on many variations of this recipe - trying it over and over again trying to get the right combination of taste, consistency, and ease of preparation. I have used readily available enzymes from the grocery store, vegetable enzymes from cheese distributors, fresh lemon juice, citric acid from the drug store, yogurt, and run-of-the mill, inexpensive white distilled vinegar. This recipe is definitely a winner-a perfect ten. The vinegar in this preparation is what makes the milk form curds. If there is too little vinegar, the curds will not fully form and you will get a smaller yield. If there is too much vinegar, you will get an acidic tasting ricotta. Accordingly, the vinegar should not exceed 5 percent of the volume of moisture. Ricotta is so easy to make and the taste so special that you will want to make it weekly to have on hand for eating and cooking. You will need to have a cooking thermometer for your first couple of attempts. The Taylor instant read pocket thermometer is my preference. It is reliable, inexpensive, and compact. Yield: 4 cups Preparation Time: 45 minutes Ingredients: * 1 gallon whole pasteurized milk * 1/3 cup plus 1 teaspoon distilled white vinegar * 1/4 teaspoon salt (more if you want a saltier taste and if you are not going to use it for desserts) Procedure: Rinse the inside of the pot you intend to use with cold water (this helps prevent the milk from scorching). Place 1 gallon milk in large, heavy non-reactive pot on medium heat. Add salt and stir briefly. Allow milk to heat up slowly, stirring occasionally. Soon you will notice steam start to form above the surface and tiny bubbles appearing on the milk. You want it to reach 180-185 degrees, near scalding temperature, just before it comes to a boil. Check the temperature with your thermometer. When it reaches the correct temperature, take the pot off the burner, add the vinegar and stir gently for only one minute. Add salt. You will notice curds forming immediately. Cover with a dry clean dish towel and allow the mixture to sit undisturbed for a couple of hours. You can also begin preparing your ricotta in the morning before going to work and let it sit until you come home. When the ricotta has rested for 2 hours or more, take a piece of cheesecloth, dampen it and place it inside a colander. With a slotted spoon, ladle out the ricotta into the prepared colander. Place the colander with ricotta inside of a larger pan so it can drain freely. Let it drain for two hours or so depending on how creamy or dry you want your cheese to be. Lift the cheesecloth up by the four corners and twist gently. If the liquid runs clear, squeeze a little more. If the liquid runs milky, there is no more need to squeeze. Place in a tight sealed container. Refrigerate. It will keep for up to 7 days. Ricotta does not freeze well. Notes I would advise against the use of low fat or part skim milk in making the ricotta. The flavor comes from the cream in the whole milk. For desserts, add 1 pint heavy whipping cream along with the milk. I use this variation when I am making ricotta for a dessert filling such as cannoli, cassata, or cream puffs. It is richer, creamier, and a bit more decadent. Grace has a cookbook coming out; it's her first. Although it's listed as being available on the Amazon.com site, it won't be printed until January or early February. Take a look. It's called, appropriately enough, "Cooking With Grace."