Tons of Milk

"Tons," of course, is a hyperbole, i.e. a figure of speech using exaggeration for emphasis. I don't actually have tons of milk, but I'm getting more at this time of year than I usually get! Between River and Saluda, I'm getting close to a gallon per day. This may not seem like much to milk producers, but for our little homestead it's a lot! The fridge fills up fast so I'm having to do something with milk about every other day.

The reason it's more than usual is because I usually share the milk with the kids. But with River's being stillborn, I'm getting all of her milk. Between the two goats I have more than enough for my regular cheeses and have started making hard, aged cheeses again. 

Straining the morning's milk and my rigged cheese press in the background.

I haven't made hard cheeses in years. 

I pretty much gave up on aged cheeses because of my cheesemaking conditions. Curing cheese requires consistent temps of between 45 and 55. In our climate, my kitchen and pantry are usually too warm, and that doesn't make for good aged cheese. I've fed more cheeses to the chickens than I care to recall. Eventually, I settled on making fresh and Mediterranean cheeses, such as mozzarella, feta, halloumi, domati, farmers, paneer, and ricotta. These aren't aged, but are typically stored in brine, olive oil, or the fridge. Some of them, like the mozzarella and halloumi, can be frozen.

With so much milk, however, I started thinking how lovely it would be to have cheese for slicing all winter. I decided maybe it was time to invest in some proper equipment for this. 

freshly pressed cheese, ready for aging

I bought a new cheese press. 

my new cheese press

It's a Roots & Harvest Cheese Press that I purchased from Pleasant Hill Grain. I haven't tried it yet, but I'll let you know what I think after I give it a try. 

Besides cheese I continue to make kefir as a regular part of our diet. I'm also making cottage cheese, which is quite delicious.

Fresh homemade cottage cheese is hard to stop eating.

And with warm weather, ice cream!

vanilla goat milk ice cream and chocolate sourdough cookies

The cookie recipe is from Kate Downham's Sourdough Without Fail. She calls them "dark chocolate cookies," but Dan and I call them "brownie cookies," because they are like fudgey brownies. It's a perfect recipe for sourdough discard. It uses coconut sugar, but not too much, so they aren't too sweet. They're just the way we like them and perfect with vanilla ice cream. 

Between milk and planting, my days are busy. In the evenings, I'm working on getting a new warp on my big loom. That will be my summer weaving project. 

Tons of Milk © 2026 by Leigh at

https://www.5acresandadream.com

New Experiments with Sourdough

 New because I experimented with sourdough in the past and had variable success. New because I now have a book by someone I have great confidence in; enough so that I'm willing to give it another go. (See this book review post for information on that.)

My starter took about five days to take off.

I've been following Kate's instructions since. 

One of the things I'm learning is how to use the "discard," i.e. the starter that is removed at feeding time. My first baking project was Kate's Sourdough Crackers (page 208).

I've made these a couple of times (they're wonderful as a snack with sliced cheese or with soup). I've also made pancakes with some of the discard (but forgot to take a picture). 

Then I tried a loaf of bread. This one is Kate's "45% Pre-Ferment" bread (page 76)

I admit it's a little wonky, but look at how nicely it rose!

There is so much good information in Kate's book. My first read-through was overwhelming, but after a few experiments and re-reading, it's starting to make sense, i.e., I see how it applies to what I'm doing. 

I'm off to a good start. 

New Experiments with Sourdough © 2026

by Leigh at https://www.5acresandadream.com

Kidding News: the Good and the Bad

 I reckon I'll start with the bad news. On March 30th, my sweet River gave birth to a single stillborn doeling.

River loves babies, so it made me doubly sad. She cried for her for about a week. 

The good news is that nine days later, Willow had twin doelings.

The is the first year I've had 100% does! And I've never had this much milk this early in the kidding season. Usually I only get the leftovers from the kids, but River is in full production, so I milk her twice a day. And Saluda's production has doubled since winter. She kidded last year and I've milked her all through the winter and she continues to produce. This has been the first winter I haven't had to buy milk to make our kefir. 

I may possibly breed for a fall kidding. It's nice to have milk all winter long.

Kidding News: the Good and the Bad © 2026

by Leigh at https://www.5acresandadream.com