Q&A for How to Make Ricotta Cheese

You can reuse whey as the liquid when making bread, giving it a sourdough flavor.

Yes, but the flavor will be less strong.

You can make it with just milk, instead of cream. You will get the best results with whole milk, though some people have success with 2%. Don't use skim.

No. The cheese will have an almost imperceptible slight bite at the back of your jaw, kind of like Greek yogurt, but much less. I prefer the Heinz distilled white vinegar, as it is guaranteed to be 5% acidic. I also like to mildly dust the draining curds with popcorn salt and 1 envelope "TRUE LEMON".

There shouldn't be visible solids in your whey. I was skeptical before trying the whey recipe above, and even while heating could not see much "ricotta-looking" material. However, once I removed the simmering whey from the heat, clouds of ricotta appeared. I didn't get tons of yield from my process but I was using skim milk powder. I would think you might have better luck with whole milk.

93 degrees Celsius or 200 degrees Farenheit. You need to cool it for 5 minutes off the heat before adding the vinegar.

Don't scoop out the solids. Drain it into a pot though a cloth over a strainer, as it says in the instructions.

Don't use ultra pasteurized milk, it won't make curds. Same with ultra pasteurized cream. Use pasteurized (not ultra pasteurized), or unhomogenized milk is even better!

About 2 cups ricotta from the heated acidified whole milk. I made ricotta from 1 gallon of whole milk and yielded 4 cups of ricotta.

The yield is generally about 25% of what you started with. Eight cups of milk = 2 cups ricotta.

Two quarts of milk should yield approximately two cups of cheese.

Lactose is the sugar in milk. The cheese is made from the fats in milk. So, theoretically, it should work fine. If you are looking for cheeses that are less likely to make you sick when you are lactose intolerant, though, store-bought hard cheeses that are very low in sugar are your best bet.

Absolutely. The yield will be less though since more of the milk proteins/solids went into the making of the farmer cheese to begin with.

Yes, as both are just milk with high percentages of fat, usually around 35%. Just substitute 1:1.

You use the same amount of lemon juice as you do vinegar. They're interchangeable.

Yes, this should be fine.

It should, but it won't be ricotta. Ricotta is a type of cheese made specifically with cows milk.

You can use a clean flour sack kitchen towel instead of cheesecloth. It may take longer to drain though.