Cheese

Cheese takes an important place at the table; not alone, in its simple place at the close of the dinner, but that it forms the foundation of many excellent dishes. The selection of good cheese requires both judgment and experience; a delicate palate and a keen sense of smell are two essential requisites, while the eye is an assistant to point out those defects independent of taste or smell. A prime cheese is readily told by a connoisseur by the color and texture, without consulting either nose or palate.

1387. - To Make Cheese

Put rennet into warm fresh milk, soaked in a little warm water, and add salt. Half a pint of renet water will turn three pails of milk. Gut the curd into squares; afterwards break it up and let it stand a few minutes; pour off the whey, tie up the curd, and hang it up to drain dry. Then chop it up in a cheese tray, put it in a cloth in the cheese mould, and press it in the screw press half an hour. Then cut it up fine, salt it, and press again for twenty-four hours, wetting the cloth previously. Take it out and turn, and put it in again in a clean wet cloth, and renew this process for three or four days. Then rub the cheese with butter or lard, and set it away in a dry place or in a wire safe. Wipe and grease it till the rind is firm, and turn it every day for several weeks.

1388. - Smearcase Or Cottage Cheese

Set by the fire some milk beginnins: to sour, till a curd is formed: then pour off the whey, tie the curd in a cloth, and hang it up to drain, not squeezing it. Drain it twelve hours. Then work it in a bowl with cream, salting to taste, and add a little fresh butter, till it is soft and smooth.

1389. - Sage Cheese

Pound fresh sage leaves in a mortar to obtain the juice, and mix it with the milk while warm, after the rennet is put in. Spinach juice is an improvement.

1391. - Cheese Puffs

Take half a pint of cheese curd strained from the whey, with a spoonful and a half of flour, three eggs, leave out the whites of two, a spoonful of orange flower water, a quarter of a nutmeg, and sugar to make it sweet; beat it in a mortar; lay a little of this paste in very small round cakes on a tin plate; if the oven is hot, they will take a quarter of an hour to bake them; serve them with pudding sauce.

1394. - Cheese Souffle, Or Diablotins

Put a gill of milk in a stewpan, with two ounces of butter; when boiling, stir in two spoonfuls of flour, keep stirring over the fire until the bottom of the stewpan is dry, then add four eggs by degrees, and a pound of grated cheese; mix well in, season with pepper, salt, and cayenne, rather highly, mould the paste into little balls with the forefinger against the side of the stewpan containing it, drop them into hot lard; fry of a nice light brown, dress in pyramid upon a napkin, and serve very hot; a quarter of that quantity may of course be made. This is an excellent dish.

1395. - Stewed Cheese

Grate two ounces of cheese; put it into a basin; mix with it a small teacup-ful of cream and an egg beaten and strained. Put into a small saucepan one ounce or half an ounce of butter, according to the richness of the cheese; let it melt, then stir in the other ingredients, and let it boil until well mixed. Serve it hot either browned or plain.

With Ale

Cut the cheese into slices, pare off the rind, and put it into a dish over a lamp; then pour on as much ale as will cover it, and let it stew until the cheese is dissolved. This is a "Welsh method, and a very good one. The cheese may be spread with mustard.

A very delicious sort of paste may also be made of any of the rich cheeses, stewed with cream and yolk of egg, either seasoned savorily or sweetened; and eaten hot or cold.