Making Whey and Cream Cheese

As I wanted to make a new tomato sauce recipe, one that was fermented I knew I needed to have some whey for it.
The question now was how to get said whey? I kept checking my yogurt and kefir as well as the buttermilk for some whey, but either they were not left alone for long enough ( cause we were using them) and then there was only a couple of tablespoons at most anyway. So thinking on what to do I finally remembered that in my Nourishing Traditions book it told me exactly how to do it!

So I looked it up and found that I could indeed get whey from my homemade Buttermilk

Here is how I did it~
First you need whole milk buttermilk.
Now the recipe calls for about 1.9 liters  of buttermilk, however I just used an amount I thought I could spare from my stash of buttermilk.
A bowl
cloth to cover bow.
glad wrap and rubber bands
mason jar and container for cream cheese

Step 1 - with your whole-milk buttermilk, let stand at room temperature 1-2 days until the milk visibly separates into white curds and yellowish whey.
Um well I actually forgot to do this step and actually moved on to step 2 with out realising I had missed step 1 and it still turned out fine.

Step 2 - Line a bowl with a cloth and secure. I used  a rubber band around the top of the bowl.

Pour in the buttermilk, cover and let stand at room temperature for several hours  The whey will run into the bowl and the milk solids will stay in the cloth.
I used glad wrap to cover and again secured with a rubber band.

Step 3 - When the whey has stopped dripping ,tie up the cloth with the milk solids inside, being careful not to squeeze. Tie this little sack to a wooden spoon placed across the top of a container so that more whey can drip out. When the bag stops dripping, the cheese is ready.

Step 4 - Store whey in a mason jar and cream cheese in a covered glass container. Refrigerated, the cream cheese keeps for about 1 month and the whey for about 6 months.

Step 5 - You can then add any seasoning or extra fruit etc to your cream cheese for extra special occasions. At this stage we had not but will be adding soon.

With the whey I made that fermented tomato sauce which I am told is really yummy. I myself don't like tomato sauce at all!

I hope you enjoy making this easy and rewarding cream cheese and whey.

Blessings to you and your homes,