Chongos Zamoranos

The last time I had an over-supply of milk I went through many of my cookbooks and made a list of recipes to try the next time it happened. Well, recently I got 4 gallons of day old whole milk from the co-op. Organic Valley, not Straus, but still pretty good. Made ~ 2 gallons each of yogurt and ricotta, the ~ is because I made 1Q of Chongos Zamoranos twice. The recipe is from the Essential Cuisines of Mexico by Diana Kennedy, it's beguiling, and I really messed it up the first time, so had to make it again. Basically it is milk that you add rennet to as if you were making cheese. You let the curds set up. Then you cook it slowly, adding sugar, so the curds cook in a syrup made of whey+sugar. It's clever as heck. And tasty, too.

I made a couple of mistakes the first time. I stirred the milk/egg yolks/rennet (mixing in the yolks) too long, so broke up the curds. That was bad, but more importantly the recipe emphasizes low heat, and even on my lowest burner turned as low as it goes, the heat was too high. The output from the 1st try was basically sponge-y protein matrix, and a ton of whey syrup. It tasted good, but the texture was wrong. Pictured is the 'protein matrix':

Executed properly it is like a really good soft baked custard in texture, but it's richer cause the whey is gone. Well, not gone, used for another purpose. The spiced syrup is nice, too.

Chongos Zamoranos:
Diana Kennedy + slight modifications
1Q whole milk
2 egg yolks
1/16 tablet rennet
1/2T cold water
4oz sugar
1 cinammon stick
1 star anise

Dissolve rennet in cold water. The 1/16 is ridiculous, I know, but if 1/4 tab is enough for 1 gallon.... let this sit for a couple of minutes to insure it dissolves.
Whisk together milk and yolks in a wide pot, heat to 110 F
Mix rennet, milk, let sit in warm place for ~30 min. The curds will separate (it'll form a mass slightly shrunken from the side of the pot).
Cut the 'mass' into 8 wedges.
Turn on heat very very low. I doubled up the cast iron trivets on the stove to get the pot far away from the heat. Worked good.
Add sugar, cinammon, anise. She didn't use anise and used dark brown sugar. I used vanilla cane sugar. The sugar forms a syrup which poaches the curds.
Let it cook down for atleast 2 hours. I did more like 5, so there wasn't much syrup left, it cooked into the curds/evaporated.

Curds are separate from the whey, wedges cut, just started cooking

Doubled up cast iron burner thingys

Final product. Curds are cohesive, but still silky. Syrup is mostly gone, glistens a little on the curds. Tasty.