Tomini elettrici

Soft cow’s milk cheese with herbs and crushed red peppers preserved under oil: most probably the most soul-touching food I miss from Piemonte (after truffled cacciatorini). The tragedy is that there’s no close relative being sold in the US and even fresh cheeses like farmer’s cheese are too grainy and lacking the twang of a real tomino from Piemonte. Needless to say, I undertook the challenge and started from scratch.
I followed the recipe of Dr. Fankhauser for Neufchatel cheese and made some tweakings.
I used ½ tablet rennet, got 2 pounds of cheese out of 1 gallon of Clover Stornetta Organic Vitamin D milk and mixed with 3 tsp of salt.

I molded the cheeses into logs and sprinkled the surface with kosher salt.
Wrapped the logs into cheese cloth and sprinkled the cloth with salt too. I aged the cheeses for one week in the upper part of the fridge into a tupperware for herbs (the ones with a grid on the bottom and some apertures on the sides to keep the right amount of moisture).

I finally cut the logs into rounds, sprinkled them with crushed red pepper and dried oregano and parsley and covered them with safflower oil. Now they are in the fridge and they just taste phenomenal.
Considering the amount of handling that the cheese has underwent I won’t keep these more than two weeks in the fridge.