Cheese Making

By Valerie | July 31, 2009

I’m really getting frustrated. I’ve been to countless stores (okay, I guess I *could* count them) and I can’t find rennet anywhere.

Dang if The Original White House Cookbook 1887 Edition that I got at a garage sale for a buck doesn’t have a whole section on making cheese (as well as lots of other wonderful old-fashioned recipes). These recipes call for rennet, too!

I’ve called and written the folks at the Junkett company and haven’t heard back yet.

I *can* get it online, but I was hoping to just get it locally. I have one more shop to call to see if they have it.

By the way, The White House Cook Book is AWESOME. I love the way the recipes are written. No list of ingredients, just stuff like “mix one half teacup of milk with a spoonful of flour”. Oh, and “make a brine strong enough to float an egg.” I guess that means salty enough so egg stays aloft. Then there’s also the coffee cup measure. A salt spoon. And lots of other terms that were probably common in the 17th century that I haven’t a clue about. It has a black bean turtle soup — but it also has a real turtle soup (one large green turtle!), plus recipes for cooking squirrel, and other critters.

I’ve already decided that I’m going to try the coleslaw recipe. It has a cooked dressing. Mostly the same stuff that would go into mayo, plus sugar and vinegar, but I want to try it out, nonetheless. I’ll post my results here when I do.

Posted in Cooking and tagged 17th Century, Brine, Clue, Coffee Cup, Coleslaw Recipe, Cook Book, Countless Stores, Critters, Cup Measure, Flour, Garage Sale, Green Turtle, Old Fashioned Recipes, Rennet, Salt Spoon, Squirrel, Turtle, Turtle Soup, Vinegar, White House Cookbook