Blue cheese and new furoshiki

I made some new furoshiki(s? what is the plural?) today. I've been wanting to get a gift for my friend Yoshio's mother, who very kindly forwards shopping on to me from Japan on occasion. I wanted to give her something she'd actually like, rather than something just for the sake of giving a gift, and finally hit on the idea of a New Zealand themed furoshiki. I went off to the quilting shop intending to choose one fabric, but of course I couldn't decide which, so I bought a few small pieces and one large. Here they are, all made up:


The small ones have, left to right, pohutukawa flowers, various native ferns and palms, pukekos, and the Victorian villas that are so common here in Dunedin. The big one (~1 metre square) has Little Blue Penguins on it.

I have decided to give Yoshio's Mum the large one, because I think she'll get more use out of it.

This is today's cheese, just after it'd been put in its mould:


This one is not pressed, but it will compact a fair bit under its own weight. Hopefully, in a few weeks, it will be all blue and mouldy. That's because it has this in it:


The last time I had a bash at cheesemaking you couldn't buy cultures. I received this lot from a place in Auckland that supplies the dairy industry - I emailed them to ask if they could sell a small amount to a hobbyist and the lovely people sent me two free samples - each of which being sufficient for 10,000 litres of milk!

I made ricotta again with the whey, and this time I took the photos I forgot to take last time! BTW, the P. roqueforti won't harm the ricotta - ricotta needs to be eaten well before the mould would have a chance to grow.

This is my cunning gadget for holding the thermometer in the whey as it heats:


Wooden utensils have a multitude of uses.

Here are the curds floating on top of the whey after the vinegar has been added:


And here they are after I scooped them off and into some muslin:


Last week I made spiced citrus custard thingies out of it - they were nice, but I think I'll try to make something different this week. Any suggestions gratefully received! Bento-friendly suggestions even more so.