Candida voluptate for your wakeup

I suppose you have already encountered in your path this Italian cheese confection. A sort of rich cream-cheese is often used in Italian cuisine to create luscious dishes, from pasta to desserts. For instance quite popular are the tagliatelle with mascarpone and walnuts or radicchio; it can also be used in place of cream to enrich sauces or stuffing featuring ricotta cheese.
Though pretty versatile and luxurious, this creamy white cheese may be a bit expensive to buy outside Italy; thankfully for us, doing it at home is pretty easy. Here you have how to.

Mascarpone
(Source: Vera’s Recipe for Homemade Mascarpone Cheese )
This recipe makes 140gm of mascarpone cheese (the yield is roughly 50%).
Ingredients:

• 250ml whipping pasteurized (not ultra-pasteurized), preferably organic cream (between 25% to 36% fat cream will do);
• 1/2 tablespoon fresh lemon juice.

Method:
Bring 1 inch of water to a boil in a saucepan. Reduce the heat to medium-low so the water is barely simmering. Pour the cream into a medium heat-resistant bowl that will fit snugly on top of the saucepan but will not touch the water. Place the bowl with the cream on the saucepan to create a double boiler. Heat the cream, stirring often, to 190 F/88 See; the cream will almost be boiling at that point.
It will take about 10-15 minutes of heating. Add the lemon juice and continue heating the mixture, stirring gently, until the cream will start looking greenish sign that the whey is starting to separate.
The cream ill just be slightly thicker at this point and you may think to have screwed up the recipe. The mascarpone will firm up and present itself to you after overnight refrigeration. Place then a fine sieve, lined with various layers of cheesecloth or a wet cotton handkerchief, over a bowl and poor the cream into the sieve letting the whey drain into the bowl. Let he cream come to room temperature before putting it in the fridge overnight to drain and set.
Keep refrigerated and use within 3 to 4 days.

Now that you know how to do it, you are free to choose the kind of cream you want to use, both as source as well as fat content. Give it a try, you will love this cheese if only simply with some chocolate/nougat spread on a toast for an elegant breakfast.