How we made cheese

I think that Lennart is to the far left, Mom is in the middle, and Margaretha is to the far right.
If anyone can identify the other children, please let me know :)

"One thing I think I forgot to describe was how we made cheese. It was always filled with anticipation because we knew how good it would taste when it

Amanda took these photos

a couple of years ago as

Mom described how to

make cheese :)

was done. Cheese was made when the cows were in the clover fields because then they gave rich and plentiful milk. That was usually in late July or early August. They’d put a big kettle on the stove with milk in. How many liters they used, I don’t know. The milk had to be heated up to a certain temperature. They would stir in the milk and use a thermometer to check exactly the right temperature. Then they would put in the rennet. In Sweden that’s called löpe. Then when the milk separated, it was time to start making the cheese.

They had a low sort of tub made of wood that stood on three legs. Inside this, you put the cheese mold. When you made the cheese, you squeeze the cheesecloth as hard as possible so not a drop of whey was wasted, it all went into the tub. This tub had an opening where they could drain out the whey after making the cheese. So you put wet cheesecloth into the cheese mold. You scooped the curd into there and squeezed it. Then a little salt. Then you continued this way – scoop, squeeze, salt – until the cheese mold was full.

Then you took another damp cheesecloth and put it over the mold. You tipped the cheese into the new cloth and took off the one you had on there when you made the

One of Mormor Elin's cheese molds :)

cheese. Then you put the cheese back into the mold. Then every day – for how long, I don’t know, but it seemed a long time – they had to turn the cheese. They would have maybe half a dozen cheeses to turn every day. You took another damp cheesecloth and laid it over the mold and turned it out onto the new cloth, rubbed it with salt, and put it back in the mold, so it could dry on that side.  When it had dried enough, so it could hold together, they would leave the cheese out on the shelf by itself on another clean cheesecloth. Sometimes when Mother thought they didn’t dry fast enough and they started to sag, she would make a band of cheesecloth and put around it to help it keep its shape. Then you could take the cheesemold off faster.

Elin holding baby Christina

Sometimes they used to talk about “a bad year for making cheese” because the cheese might tend to mold. If that was the case, then they had the idea that they might put a little brännvin in the milk when they were making the cheese.  Of course, Dad had no such thing in his house and he refused to go the brewery or liquor store and buy any, so Mother had to go to her dad or later her brother Nisse i Grönede and get some brännvin for her cheese. My Dad had never even tasted wine until he came to California to visit us. Then he said, “Now I’m here and this is what you make, so I’m going to taste it.” He said it was good.

Well, now back to the whey.  All the curd was out of it now and the whey was put back into the big kettle. They boiled the whey on the stove for hours and hours, maybe more than one day. It was a long process. They called it “boiling together.” Stuff came to the top of the pot that turned out tannish brown. This was called messmör. We used it to spread on sandwiches. I loved it.

And making cheese at Kjettestorp wasn’t enough. The poorer people around, Sågstugan, Skobyhylte or Sandstugan, they announced that they were having an ysta as it was called, the process of making cheese. So one day would be Sågstugan, the next week Skobyhylte and the next week Sandstugan. So

This is one way Messmör is sold in Sweden today

then on that day the women from the farms all around would come with a milkcan of milk. I don’t remember how many liters they each brought, but all the local women would help the woman in that house to make cheese. That was sort of one kind of charity in those days."