Thursday, January 15, 2009

Tom is AWESOME!

He bought me four different kinds of goats cheese. No longer shall I dream about cheese! The cheddar is amazing!

He also polished by boots for me as I ate my breakfast.

I love him.

Sunday, January 11, 2009

11 Jan - Cosy walking

Yesterday was so happy. I styled Thirza's hair for her, and nattered and shopped for a couple of hours. Then I cycled home and the Common was a Christmas card of Frost and white and crunchy crisp. There were squirrels leaping hither and thither and magpies in pairs for joy dancing to and fro.

When I got in , I had a gentle spot of lunch before going to Yoga and nearly falling asleep during the meditation. Yoga wasn't as relaxing as last time, but I still felt very euphoric afterwards. That definately helped with the cleaning and tidying I did in my room for the rest of the afteroon.

In the evening I went to Tom's for a fondue party. I've recently gone cow's milk free in a bid to stop my eczema being hideously painful, so I made my own goats's cheese to make my own fondue. 

Making cheese is very simple. This recipe makes enough for 1 for one meal, and the cheese is quite like feta, or paneer.

Take 500 ml full fat milk.  Boil until it starts to foam. 

Add 50mls lemon juice and stir till it starts to curdle.

Take off the heat. The curds should start to coagulate together. If they don't, add some more lemon juice.

Put a clean muslin, tea towel or cloth over a bowl. Pour the curds and whey into the cloth and hold it so you can squeeze the whey out of it. When you have squeezed most of the whey out of it, open up the cloth, run some cold water over it and squeeze it again. 

Tie up the cheese and cloth over a bowl and leave to drip for a while, I left mine for 10 mins. Lightly salt the cheese and squeeze again.

If you eat it at this stage it is quite like paneer. If you put the cloth under a weight for a few hours the cheese will be denser and more like feta.

There was lots of naff music on during the fondue party, and when Respect by Erasure wafted over us, we got it into our heads to go to Reflex, and 80's club in town. So we did. Spontaneity is great fun. Much dancing ensued.

When we got home, the chaps had to practically scrape me from the ceiling. I've not been so happy for a long time.