Photograph from angela n. on Flickr This past weekend I drove about 2 hours down to Bucks County, Pennsylvania, to see a good friend from college get married in the backyard of his parents' beautiful historic farmhouse. The food in general was better than average, but was topped off by an incredible dessert spread of Italian pastries and cakes all baked by the groom's sister, an Italian-trained pastry chef. During the cocktail hour, I was given insider information from the groom's other sister not to miss the mini-cannoli (also called cannulicchi), which were the real deal--made with sheep's milk ricotta rather than mascarpone or, heaven forbid, custard. Adding to their value was their relative scarcity: there were only 30...
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Not long ago, the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission began a program to outfit all yellow cabs with a backseat multifunction TV screen, one that can track the cab's location with GPS, show up-to-the-minute weather reports, and broadcast clips from local news shows. I kind of hate these screens because they make me nauseated (as does reading in cars), but the other day when I happened to see a short clip from ABC news about a local ricotta cheese making operation, I just had to watch....
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If you want to try your hand at making cheese at home, the easiest one to start with is Ricotta. Ricotta is traditionally made with the whey left over from making mozzarella. In fact, the word ricotta in Italian means "recooked" and refers to the fact that the whey is cooked and curdled again after the first batch of cheese is made. However, it is also possible to make ricotta directly from whole milk, and even store-bought milk works well (whereas with most other cheese, store-bought milk will not curdle properly)....
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