Hello, I'm Hester
Between the Dots is a journal dedicated to the quiet beauty found in ordinary moments. A space to share glimmers of light and hope, discover the world, and not shy away from tough questions. Welcome. I hope you’ll find yourself at home between these stories of things we tend to overlook.
table of contents
- ......................................... quiet beauty
- ...................................... simple recipes
- ............................................ slow travel
- ....................................... sustainability
- ................................................... health
- ............................................... Theology
- ................................ on being a woman
- ............................................... marriage
- .............................................. thoughts
When I first started baking cheesecakes, I quickly discovered that cream cheese is quite an expensive ingredient, and this fun new hobby was absolutely not friendly for your wallet. At the time, the costs for the ingredients for a simple cheesecake added up to €16, which is quite a lot when you’re on a student budget. So I turned to making my own cream cheese, which is much more affordable and actually not that difficult. Moreover, there aren’t any unwanted ingredients added to improve shelf life.
In the recipe below I added some useful tips but simply put, making your own cream cheese comes down to this: pour one liter of organic full-fat yogurt onto a cheesecloth and hang it over a bowl for 12 hours. That’s all.
Two useful tips: 1. Be sure to use plain organic full-fat yoghurt, because commercial and low-fat yoghurt don’t work too well for this.
2. If you want to make a cheesecake with homemade cream cheese, start two days before you want to serve your cheesecake. That gives you enough time to get the right consistency for the cream cheese and to let the cheesecake set in the fridge.
the recipe
ingredients
1 liter organic full-fat yogurt
cheesecloth or muslin
bowl
makes about 400g
- Place a large square of clean cheesecloth over a bowl, and pour the yogurt onto it.
- Bunch the ends of the cloth together, either by making a knot or using an elastic band or string.
- Suspend the bundle over a large bowl – I attach mine to a wooden spoon and hang it on two hooks, but get creative and do what works for you.
- Make sure the cloth is above the bowl – you’re going to be straining out the whey, and that doesn’t work too well if the cloth is hanging in the liquid.
- Drain for 12 to 24 hours, however, do experiment with this. I find 12 hours is usually enough, but it depends on the time of year, the quality of the yoghurt, and the temperature in my kitchen.
- That’s it, you’ve made your own cream cheese.
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