The Best Feta Cheese Recipe

I’ve tried numerous different recipes for Feta Cheese and though all produced an edible cheese, some were better than others. Over time I took pieces of this recipe or that, with the end result that I now have a recipe for Feta that I call my own. The results are consistently delicious – and everyone who tries it, raves about it.

What you will need:

1 gallon goat milk

1 packet Thermophilic Culture (I use C201 available at www.cheesemaking.com)

1/8 tsp Lipase (optional but gives it s sharper flavor)

¼ tsp Calcium Chloride (optional – it helps goat milk to form a firmer curd)

¼ tsp Animal Rennet

Salt

Heat the milk to 100F (38C).

Add the Culture and Lipase. Allow the culture to reconstitute for 2 minutes, then stir thoroughly for about 30 seconds. Place a lid on the pot and set a timer for 30 minutes.

Add the Calcium Chloride and Rennet to a couple of tablespoons of cold water, then stir thoroughly into the milk. Allow to set for 60 minutes. The curds should now be the consistency of a very thick yogurt or tofu.

Cut the curds into ½” pieces. Allow to rest 30 minutes.

Stir the curd mass gently. Allow to rest 30 minutes.

Repeat the stir and rest two more times.

After the third stir, I set up my mold. A cheese press is not required and even a mold is not required but you need to have some way to drain the whey from the curds and in my experience a mold works well for this. I place the mold onto a square of fabric canvas, and then on a cookie cooling sheet which is resting over a pan to catch the whey. Gently spoon the curds into the mold. Allow to drain for 1 hour.

Flip the mold. To do this I place a second square of plastic canvas over the top, sandwich the mold and both pieces of plastic canvas between my hands, and invert the whole thing. Allow to drain for 1 more hour.

Flip again. Drain for 2 hours.

Flip again. Drain for 4 hours.

At this point the weight of the curds have compressed the cheese to about half of its original volume as the whey has drained off, and it should be quite solid.

Take a glass bowl and sprinkle the base liberally with salt. Cut the curds into 1” (approximately) squares, and layer over the salt. Once the bottom of the bowl is covered, sprinkle salt liberally over that layer and continue with another layer of cheese cubes. Continue layering until all cubes are in the bowl.

Refrigerate for 1 week. Remove from fridge and in a clean bowl, repeat the above process. Now what was the top layer becomes the bottom layer.

Return to fridge for one more week.

Your cheese is ready to eat! We like the cubes as they are, or alternately, will place some in the food processor and pulse until they are crumbled, which allows for easy sprinkling into various recipes. A favorite snack around here is fresh tomatoes, a cube of feta and a leaf of basil. Mmmmmm – the flavor combination is amazing.