The evolution of cows
Making ricotta cheese
One of the strange by-products of this particular downtime here in the UK is the BBC always trying to teach you something. It’s almost as if some hack in the back office said, ah, this is our chance to shine. Let us make the British public proper quizmasters. They will never lose another pub quiz. They are going to know so much about everything, it will be amazing. We now have hours of educational learning, provided by famous faces, for everything from bedtime stories to science experiments. They will be the rulers of the Zoom world.
The Beeb has an extensive back catalogue, although it is not why I was watching Britain’s Ancient Capital: The Secrets of Orkney, as that was more down to the fact that I’ve never met a Neolithic stone circle I didn’t like. However, in this particular episode, it showed the results of an abandoned island, Swona, which was home to a herd of formerly domestic cows. I enjoyed how they went feral after awhile, kind of like most of our children after several weeks of home schooling. Which was quite neat to see.
In between all this television watching, I made ricotta cheese with the abundance of milk. I occasionally do this as ricotta can sometimes be a bit tricky to get hold of in the grocery stores and it’s nice in a pasta dish. I’d like to thank my boss, Sarah, for providing me with the cheese making kit in the first place. I showed my offspring how it was being made, but while he demanded mozzarella, he was unwilling to do any kneading, so none of that for him. He still ate it in the finished dish. I still prefer to just eat cheese rather than make it myself.
It goes to show you how hard cheese makers work, and how we should support them and pay for their delicious output. As UK farmhouse cheddar Mary Quicke says, “Get to know the cheese mongers, food producers, butchers and chefs reaching out online.”
