Man of Honour
- Joined
- 16 May 2005
- Posts
- 31,297
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- Manchester
Today a few of us (including uv from here) made halloumi from scratch. This is our first time making cheese so I'll have to ask any pro cheese makers to forgive us for any mistakes or short-cuts 
I also didn't get many decent pictures so I'll have to apologise for any quality issues or missing pictures.
First off, the ingredients. We were making quite a big batch so you won't need quite as much milk as we used
18 pints of full fat milk
Some animal rennet
Sea salt
Dried mint leaves
The rennet is what we use to set the cheese by separating the curds and the whey.
Aside from this, we used the following equipment:
Some big stew pans
A thermometer that can measure 20-100C
Cheese cloth (or, as we couldn't get some in time, some unused stockings...)
Some containers to put the chunks of halloumi and the brine in once complete
Method
Empty the milk into the various large pans.
Using the thermometer, raise the temperature of the milk to 32C. If it goes any higher, wait for it to cool down before going on to the next step. Once it hits this temperature turn off the heat.
For each 4 pints of milk in a pan you will need 1/2 a teaspoon of rennet mixed with 1/2 teaspoon of bottled (or pre-boiled *AND COOLED*) water. Add this rennet/water mix to the milk and stir very thoroughly.
Now you need to leave the milk for about an hour.
Come back to the milk and the curds and whey should have separated nicely. You should be able to run a knife through the curds and make a clean cut whilst doing so. If you can't, leave it for another 10 minutes.
Once the curds and whey are ready, cut the curds into cubes in the pan. Now leave it for another 10 minutes and get your cheese cloth (or stockings...) ready.
Now we spoon the curds into the cheesecloth/stockings and press it down a little until it's roughly the size of two normal blocks of halloumi. Apologies for the poor picture.
Once you've done all this you'll need to hang up the cheesecloth somewhere so the whey can drip out and the curds can set into nice blocks.
After an hour (or longer if you like) a lot of the whey should have dripped out of the moulds and the blocks should feel fairly solid. You'll still be able to easily crush them in your hands but they won't feel like jelly any more. At this point we can remove the cheese cloth and turn the moulded curds out onto a tray.
Now we need to heat up the left over whey to 90C.
...and add the blocks of curd to the whey. Once you do this, turn off the heat and leave them in there for about 20 minutes. The curds should float to the top once they are cooked.
Once done lay out the cooked curds on to a draining board. Sprinkle with fine sea salt on all sides.
Whilst they are cooling off and drying out we now mix up the brine that the curds will sit in for up to a month in your fridge. This is made up of 45% bottled or pre-boiled (and cooled) water, 45% the left over whey and 10% sea salt (*and* a teaspoon of the dried mint leaves). Mix this all together and fill up your containers with it. Then place the halloumi blocks into the containers. This can sit in your fridge for a month (maybe more) and stay fresh. I imagine that the taste is best after at least a week.
We couldn't wait that long though so we made some immediately. Nom nom.
I also didn't get many decent pictures so I'll have to apologise for any quality issues or missing pictures.
First off, the ingredients. We were making quite a big batch so you won't need quite as much milk as we used
18 pints of full fat milk
Some animal rennet
Sea salt
Dried mint leaves
The rennet is what we use to set the cheese by separating the curds and the whey.
Aside from this, we used the following equipment:
Some big stew pans
A thermometer that can measure 20-100C
Cheese cloth (or, as we couldn't get some in time, some unused stockings...)
Some containers to put the chunks of halloumi and the brine in once complete
Method
Empty the milk into the various large pans.
Using the thermometer, raise the temperature of the milk to 32C. If it goes any higher, wait for it to cool down before going on to the next step. Once it hits this temperature turn off the heat.
For each 4 pints of milk in a pan you will need 1/2 a teaspoon of rennet mixed with 1/2 teaspoon of bottled (or pre-boiled *AND COOLED*) water. Add this rennet/water mix to the milk and stir very thoroughly.
Now you need to leave the milk for about an hour.
Come back to the milk and the curds and whey should have separated nicely. You should be able to run a knife through the curds and make a clean cut whilst doing so. If you can't, leave it for another 10 minutes.
Once the curds and whey are ready, cut the curds into cubes in the pan. Now leave it for another 10 minutes and get your cheese cloth (or stockings...) ready.
Now we spoon the curds into the cheesecloth/stockings and press it down a little until it's roughly the size of two normal blocks of halloumi. Apologies for the poor picture.
Once you've done all this you'll need to hang up the cheesecloth somewhere so the whey can drip out and the curds can set into nice blocks.
After an hour (or longer if you like) a lot of the whey should have dripped out of the moulds and the blocks should feel fairly solid. You'll still be able to easily crush them in your hands but they won't feel like jelly any more. At this point we can remove the cheese cloth and turn the moulded curds out onto a tray.
Now we need to heat up the left over whey to 90C.
...and add the blocks of curd to the whey. Once you do this, turn off the heat and leave them in there for about 20 minutes. The curds should float to the top once they are cooked.
Once done lay out the cooked curds on to a draining board. Sprinkle with fine sea salt on all sides.
Whilst they are cooling off and drying out we now mix up the brine that the curds will sit in for up to a month in your fridge. This is made up of 45% bottled or pre-boiled (and cooled) water, 45% the left over whey and 10% sea salt (*and* a teaspoon of the dried mint leaves). Mix this all together and fill up your containers with it. Then place the halloumi blocks into the containers. This can sit in your fridge for a month (maybe more) and stay fresh. I imagine that the taste is best after at least a week.
We couldn't wait that long though so we made some immediately. Nom nom.
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