After the truly yummilicious Vanilla Bean Mascarpone Ice Cream I made last week, I ran across recipes for making mascarpone at home, and wow, it’s easy! There are several online sources citing double boilers and various other torturous ways of doing it, and also formulas requiring tartaric acid which is something you won’t find in your normal, run-of-the-mill cupboard. But apparently, it can be done with heavy cream and lemon juice. There’s not a recipe for it in my Lekue cheesemaker book or the One Hour Cheese book by Claudia Lucero that was so inspiring. Maybe that’s because it takes more than one hour – it needs to sit overnight in the fridge to drain the whey.
The recipe I bookmarked, for its ease and presentation, is from That Skinny Chick Can Bake and it has a link to Chocolate Mascarpone Cheesecake that is also very tempting! There’s a video from Kvali Foods that lets you see how easy it is as well. Finding heavy cream that is not ultra-pasteurized (UP) may be the hardest part, and apparently it is possible to do with ultra-pasteurized, so that might not even be an issue. I finally broke down and went to Whole Paycheck Foods and found some non-UP cream there, since I couldn’t find any at Sprouts or Kroger. (Yes, I have an attitude about Whole Foods but it isn’t really the prices; it’s the maniac customers who try to mow down pedestrians in the parking lot, something I have experienced almost every dang time I go there.)
This is the mascarpone after sitting overnight in the fridge. And although the Lekue basket is about the size of a pint-sized container, this ended up being slightly more than 1 cup in volume.
It’s so creamy! It’s an artifact of using my iPhone for photos, I suppose, that it looks a little yellow and buttery – it didn’t seem yellow. It’s just a little thicker than creme fraiche, and tastes something like it. I admit I don’t remember the texture and taste of commercial mascarpone – I will need to buy some and make another batch to compare.
For a little yumminess, I put a tablespoon of the mascarpone in a dish with some blueberries for a cute photo. Then I ate it. But I’m saving the mascarpone for a special ice cream – peanut butter. I’m hoping to get something like peanut butter fudge, with the creaminess of the Vanilla Bean Mascarpone Ice Cream in my recipe.
Bring the cream to a low simmer - one source said "large pan" but hey, 2 cups is nothing. Next time I'm grabbing my small pan! The temp you are looking for is 185-190F, it seems. Add the lemon juice, and simmer at 185-190 for about 5 minutes. This varied from recipe to recipe, from 2 - 8 minutes. I'm guessing that means it's ok to do more or less 5 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool to room temperature. Some recipes said 30 minutes; one said 20 minutes; another said room temperature. I'm going on 45 minutes, and it's nowhere near room temp yet. Line a colander or strainer with cheesecloth or a tea towel or coffee filters or even paper towels. Pour the room temp cheese into the colander, cover with plastic, and refrigerate for at least 8 hours and possibly more. Here's where my cute little Lekue cheese maker came in handy! Scrape the cheese from the filter material into a container; apparently this whey should be tossed and not kept for some other use (no idea why) although one commenter mentioned feeding it to their dog. One blogger said she got no whey, another said not very much - I had probably 3/4 cup of whey, which I gave to my dog. (She lapped it up) I'm not sure what that means - maybe weather - room temps - humidity - not sure what affects cheesemaking.Homemade Mascarpone
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I know, I know, I love gadgets and swag and stuff from my hobbies. I got this ThermoWorks Chef Alarm directly from the ThermoWorks website, after learning it’s a lot cheaper than other retailers because they don’t license anyone else to carry their products. That means any you find for sale on Amazon or elsewhere were purchased full price from ThermoWorks – and it also means ThermoWorks won’t honor the warranty if you didn’t buy it directly from them.
A note about Ultra Pasteurization –
I have noticed over the past few years how long organic milk stayed fresh in my fridge, and am just now learning that it’s because of ultra pasteurization (UP). If long shelf life for milk is your goal, this works. It’s heated to 280 F for 2 seconds, which kills a lot of bacteria that would otherwise make the milk go bad sooner. Those bacteria, however, help make things like cheese – the heat can’t really differentiate between the good and bad bacteria. Pasteurization is normally done at 151 F for 15 seconds, which also kills a lot of bacteria (almost as much), so a lot of the online cheese making I’ve read about encourages using raw milk. This is pretty much only if you happen to own a milk cow or live near someone else who does. Well, in Texas, it is legal for farmers to sell raw milk directly to consumers, like on the farm as well as at farmers markets and farm stands*; in some states, like Louisiana, it’s illegal to sell raw milk at all. I’m not a food purist, so I’ll go for homogenized and pasteurized, although it might be adventurous to try some cheeses and ice creams with raw milk! OK, maybe cheeses. I don’t actually think it would make a huge difference in ice cream, because COLD. I need to track down the rant I read online about using premium quality ingredients in ice cream, where the ranter did blind taste-testing, and not one single taste tester could tell the difference between cheaper store brand regular milk and cream and the high-falutin’ fancy expensive stuff. Really, it’s cold, it’s sweet, it’s yummy – just eat it.
*The state legislature did not pass the bill to sell raw milk off the farm (like farmers markets) after all, so raw milk can only be sold on farms if there is a store on site that passes health inspections, but nowhere else. Because listeria (although I’m sure Blue Bell ice cream isn’t made from raw milk).
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