We're reviewing Miyoko Schinner's vegan cheese book. This is the first recipe in the book, and the cashew recipe is the base for many other cheeses in the book, so we thought it a good place to start. Chèvre is a goat's cheese which we've never eaten so making comparisons is difficult. It's also difficult to know if you've achieved the same results as the author...
Before it's moulded into shape, the cheese looks remarkably like mascarpone, with a thick soft cheese texture. We're quite excited about the rejuvelac culturing method that Miyoko uses in most of the recipes, including this one. Rejuvelac is a fermented liquid made from sprouted grains that has a sharp tangy taste. Fermenting cheeses this way gives them an authentic cheesy flavour.
The Chèvre is tasty and very cheese like, although slightly grainy. You'll need a really powerful blender to get the soaked cashews smooth and silky if you want to overcome that. The cheese is made from nothing but soaked cashews, which are blended then cultured. The Chèvre is then flavoured with yeshi (nutritional yeast) and a little salt.
When I make cashew milk, I grind the nuts in a coffee grinder (one that I don't use for coffee!). That results in a very fine powder. But I grind them unsoaked, so I've no idea what the result would be with soaked cashews. I wonder if you could grind them first, then soak the resulting powder, hmmmm. As for a blender... if price is no object, then I guess one of those VitaMix beasts :)
ReplyDeleteThose Vitamix beasts cost a pretty penny... we went for a Magimix in the end. We've got a small coffee grinder and also find it very versatile, but you need large amounts of blended cashews for the cashew cheeses.
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