a Quickie Post: Had to Share this Website

I have spent the last several days trying to track down RENNET here in Buenos Aires to make cheese.

Of course, in Buenos Aires, I can't just walk into a store and ask for rennet. First I need to know how to say rennet in spanish. The jury is still out on that. Based on my research, it's either:
cuajo
cuajada
quimosina

When I ask for cuajo, I am sometimes offered the stomach of an animal.
When I ask for cuajada I am sometimes told I should just buy yogourt.
I can apparently buy quimosina and have it delivered to my manufacturing facility, as long as I purchase a minimum of 20 kilos.

So, of course, I thought that if I can't buy it, perhaps I can make it. Back to the Internet...which we should all take a moment to appreciate as the greatest frugal luxury ever. Access to the expertise of every like-minded, half-crazy, making-cheese-in-the-backyard-with-my-own-goat-milk genius on the planet.

And I stumbled across this:

http://garlic-breath.blogspot.com/2008/03/stinging-nettle-rennet-works.html

And I stopped to do a little happy dance.

On the one hand, it's not good news, because the one stinging nettle that cropped up in our garden last year died from a failed transplant. My husband tried to re-pot it (long story).

On the other hand.....it's not good news because I now live in a subtropical climate and have fig trees...but no one can tell me how to successfully make rennet from figs.

Still, it has given me hope. A boost to my obsessive need to track down the solution to homemade feta.

Many thanks to Garlic Breath and all you geniuses out there who are guiding me through the process of making my own smoked salmon, cured ham, yogurt, beef jerky, pizza dough, pasta, etc.