Friday, August 14, 2009

Leipajuusto - Finnish Squeaky Cheese

As a young girl one of the many warm memories of life on the farm is of my mom making cheese. This was no ordinary cheese, but a very special treat. My dad was a Guernsey farmer during his career days, and a great farmer was he! I'm quite certain that the combination of Mom's recipe and Dad's sweet milk from the Guernseys is what made for a perfect pan of cheese.

Since juusto was something that we had around at all times, whether fresh or frozen, I did not quite realize the novelty of it. Little did I know that most people knew nothing of it! I certainly did not know what a special thing it was to some. It was only after years of being away from home that I realized that this was something really very special. Not only was it a warm memory of Mom getting it ready, but also a realization that this is not something that can be easily bought or made by just anybody!

As the years rolled on by and I started doing some of my own traditions, I finally decided to take time to learn how to make squeaky cheese so that I could pass the tradition on to others. There must have been about five phone calls to mom and a couple to my sisters and one "sit down and write" instruction period when I couldn't get things quite right. In fact, the first week I made this juusto SIX times just to try perfect it! Whew. I wished I could've been back home in Minnesota watching exactly how to make it when the idea of creating a DVD was born. I figured that if some of these things made me wonder even after watching the process so many times so many years ago, then I'm sure others would wonder as well.

So that is how I came to creating the DVD on making Leipajuusto, Squeaky cheese. Already some have watched and enjoyed and learned, and now my purpose is for others to do the same.

Check back in a couple days and I should have the DVD available as a download.

Susan

Squeaky Cheese - Leipajuusto

Coming soon.....I have created a downloadable DVD that will show the step by step process of making Finnish cheese, leipajuusto, juusto, squeaky cheese...whatever you may call it. Check back in a few days to see if it's up and running yet!