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why brunost is so tasty
Jan. 25th, 2016 10:22 pmDespite (or because of?) being tired much of yesterday, and wishing before I went to bed that today could be another weekend, I seem to have found some much needed energy as I slept.
I woke up at 05:30, with the motivation to do my before-getting-out-of-bed situps etc. And then did 50 minutes of workout as suggested by my phone app. Then I walked the 46 minutes to the office, and happily worked till time for my 13:15 appointment with my physical trainer. (ok, till just past time, since I didn't actually stand up from my desk till 13:15, so I ran to the gym, which, fortunately, is in the next building.)
Then I returned to the office and worked some more, so I managed just over 6.5 hours today (which is good, while I am supposed to work four five-hour days each week, I had gotten a bit behind the last part of December and the first part of January, so I need to do a bit extra here and there to make up for it). Then I still had enough energy remaining that on the walk home I ran for a number of short distances. I never do that. I have (nearly) always prided myself on never running at all, yet, I was in a good enough mood that the extra movement sounded fun (and it was). As a result the home trip was only 42 minutes.
After all that I *still* had energy, so I decided to convert the last of the whey from this weekend's cheese into brunost, the Norwegian style brown cheese that tastes like caramel. I had already turned two cups of the whey into bread rolls on Sunday, so that left me about 1.15 liters for today's experiment. Reading up on the internet told me that the trick is to heat whey till it is getting thick, add some cream, and keep heating till it is as thick as you want it.
While it was cooking I also roasted a butternut pumpkin and toasted the seeds. The seeds I ate straight away, because I cannot resist them, but I ate only a tiny bit of the pumpkin.
The progression from Whey to Brunost today
start heating 1.15 liters of whey at 17:10:
after 50 minutes it had reduced to 1 liter
after 1 hr, 30 minutes it was 0.8 liters
after 1 hr, 15 minutes it was 0.9 liters
after 2 hr, 20 minutes it was 0.6 liters
after 2 hr, 40 minutes it was 0.5 liters
after 2 hr, 50 minutes it was 0.4 liters
at the 3 hour mark it was getting rather thick, though not really browning yet--only a pale kinda golden colour. I didn't have any cream in the house, so I decided to see what happens if one uses Turkish yoghurt instead, so I added 1 dl of that, which brought the volume back to 0.4 liters. I switched at that point from using a metal spoon for occasional stirring to using a flat coiled whisk thingie to break up the yoghurt chunks and get it well blended, and then kept using the whisk.
By 3.5 hours the texture was like an over-thickened gravy, but the colour was still only golden, not brown.
At 3 hrs, 40 minutes it had the texture of a very thick paste, bu was still not browning, so I added 1 tablespoon of milk, to make it easier to stir.
Ditto at 4 hours, so I added another tablespoon of milk.
another tablespoon of milk added at 4 hours and five minutes, as it was once again getting a bit thick to stir with the whisk. At that point I started seeing tiny wedges of nicely browned cheese in the mix, so I switched to a heat-proof rubber spatula and started mashing them in and scraping the sides and bottom of the pot as I kept blending everything together.
at 4 hours and 10 minutes I decided it was getting too thick to stir anymore, so I scraped it all into a single silicon muffin tin. Total yield from the 1.15 liters of whey (plus 0.145 liters extra milk products) was just over 1 dl--it heaped out the top of that muffin tin like a small cupcake. Concentrate that much dairy into such a small space, and of course it will be yummy (and only meant to be eaten in very small quantities). I never did get it as brown as I would have liked, but it is a pale brown.
Next time I want to try it with cream instead, and I want to see if I can have the patience to get it browner before I start adding the cream. I also think it might be fun to buy one of those silicon molds for doing chocolate candies and pack the cheese into that before chilling--then I would have cute little cheese-candies, in a reasonable serving size without the need to slice off bits...
Thank you again![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
northernotter for introducing me to yummy Norwegian cheeses...
I woke up at 05:30, with the motivation to do my before-getting-out-of-bed situps etc. And then did 50 minutes of workout as suggested by my phone app. Then I walked the 46 minutes to the office, and happily worked till time for my 13:15 appointment with my physical trainer. (ok, till just past time, since I didn't actually stand up from my desk till 13:15, so I ran to the gym, which, fortunately, is in the next building.)
Then I returned to the office and worked some more, so I managed just over 6.5 hours today (which is good, while I am supposed to work four five-hour days each week, I had gotten a bit behind the last part of December and the first part of January, so I need to do a bit extra here and there to make up for it). Then I still had enough energy remaining that on the walk home I ran for a number of short distances. I never do that. I have (nearly) always prided myself on never running at all, yet, I was in a good enough mood that the extra movement sounded fun (and it was). As a result the home trip was only 42 minutes.
After all that I *still* had energy, so I decided to convert the last of the whey from this weekend's cheese into brunost, the Norwegian style brown cheese that tastes like caramel. I had already turned two cups of the whey into bread rolls on Sunday, so that left me about 1.15 liters for today's experiment. Reading up on the internet told me that the trick is to heat whey till it is getting thick, add some cream, and keep heating till it is as thick as you want it.
While it was cooking I also roasted a butternut pumpkin and toasted the seeds. The seeds I ate straight away, because I cannot resist them, but I ate only a tiny bit of the pumpkin.
The progression from Whey to Brunost today
start heating 1.15 liters of whey at 17:10:
after 50 minutes it had reduced to 1 liter
after 1 hr, 30 minutes it was 0.8 liters
after 1 hr, 15 minutes it was 0.9 liters
after 2 hr, 20 minutes it was 0.6 liters
after 2 hr, 40 minutes it was 0.5 liters
after 2 hr, 50 minutes it was 0.4 liters
at the 3 hour mark it was getting rather thick, though not really browning yet--only a pale kinda golden colour. I didn't have any cream in the house, so I decided to see what happens if one uses Turkish yoghurt instead, so I added 1 dl of that, which brought the volume back to 0.4 liters. I switched at that point from using a metal spoon for occasional stirring to using a flat coiled whisk thingie to break up the yoghurt chunks and get it well blended, and then kept using the whisk.
By 3.5 hours the texture was like an over-thickened gravy, but the colour was still only golden, not brown.
At 3 hrs, 40 minutes it had the texture of a very thick paste, bu was still not browning, so I added 1 tablespoon of milk, to make it easier to stir.
Ditto at 4 hours, so I added another tablespoon of milk.
another tablespoon of milk added at 4 hours and five minutes, as it was once again getting a bit thick to stir with the whisk. At that point I started seeing tiny wedges of nicely browned cheese in the mix, so I switched to a heat-proof rubber spatula and started mashing them in and scraping the sides and bottom of the pot as I kept blending everything together.
at 4 hours and 10 minutes I decided it was getting too thick to stir anymore, so I scraped it all into a single silicon muffin tin. Total yield from the 1.15 liters of whey (plus 0.145 liters extra milk products) was just over 1 dl--it heaped out the top of that muffin tin like a small cupcake. Concentrate that much dairy into such a small space, and of course it will be yummy (and only meant to be eaten in very small quantities). I never did get it as brown as I would have liked, but it is a pale brown.
Next time I want to try it with cream instead, and I want to see if I can have the patience to get it browner before I start adding the cream. I also think it might be fun to buy one of those silicon molds for doing chocolate candies and pack the cheese into that before chilling--then I would have cute little cheese-candies, in a reasonable serving size without the need to slice off bits...
Thank you again
northernotter for introducing me to yummy Norwegian cheeses...
