Sunday 17 February 2008

Culture of Italian Food Field Trip

Friday the 8th was our field trip with my favorite teacher Mr. Peter Fischer-he's 100% German and knows more about everything than even my Dad. In fact- Daddy, you should meet this man I think you could be friends. Anyway, for our field trip we went to another 'full circle' farm which just means that everything they produce is used again to help produce/feed something else. This one was specifically a dairy farm and they raised little sheepies and made mile and cheeseeeeee! We learned how to make cheese- it takes about 5liters of sheeps milk to make 2 liters of peccorino cheese and then about another liter of ricotta.

To make cheese the cute old Italian man heats up the milk in this HUGE steal pot to about 70degrees celcius which is just below boiling. Then you cover it with a sheet type deal and let is sit for liiike 10 minutes which lets the cheese and whey separate. One this is done all the yummy formaggio settles to the bottom and you pull it out, put it in this strainer and let the water drain out and the cheese to cool!
THEN to make Ricotta- which means re-cooked, you heat up the milk/whey mixture once again and basically go through the same process but this time a mushier cheese gets made.
We of course has tasting and the Peccorino was sooo good but the Recotta kind of just tastes like nothing. I guess my American palate isn't delicate enough.
The farm! those brown spots to the right of the dog are the sheeps!
Beautiful day in Perugia- it was freezing though.
These are sheep being fed and then milked. It smelled SO nasty. That little baby sheep just kept whoring around sucking any nipple she could get to.
Sheep butt! I have a little stuffed animal sheep with a rattle in its tail that looked exactly like that little baby.
Suzeanne helded that baby like it was her own child.
FORMAGGIO! He's collecting the Peccorino from the bottom after its been cooling for a bit.
Whey is good for your skin- this old man had the hands of child

These are all Suze's pictures since I'm having battery problems with my camera. so THANKS SUZEANNE!

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