Lithuanian Apple Cheese

The Poole plate looks enough like Crown Lynn Colourglaze to satisfy me, though a purist will spot that it's not the real thing (irony alert!) A slice of apple cheese shaped in a terrine, and that's a chunk of Tinui ewe's milk blue from the wonderful Kingsmeade Cheese in the Wairarapa.

I have been making this for a long time, but only every couple of years. Use it like quince paste, to serve with cheese or just as a sweetmeat. The recipe comes from Lithuanian Traditional Foods (Yowza! I paid a lot less than USD195 for my copy!) You can halve the quantities, but it keeps for ages. It makes less than you'd think - say a kilo and a half?

Recipe:
Peel and thinly slice 5 kg apples. You must use apples that keep their shape well while cooking, or the end product will be yucky and mushy, where you want it to be firm enough to slice.

Combine the apple with 1.5 kg sugar and let sit, covered, for 48 hours.

Strain, retaining the liquid. In a large pot, reduce the liquid by half.

Add 3/4 of the apple slices and cook until there is no liquid remaining. The apple slices will turn to apple sauce, and the whole thing should be dark red or amber like apple jelly. Stir it very frequently (you could experiment with a slow cooker here.)

Add the rest of the apple and a teaspoon or more of spice. The book says cinnamon - cardamom is amazing too, and I could also imagine that orange zest plus clove would be good. Cook until the last of the apple is soft and well cooked through but still pale in colour.

Dampen a cheese bag or an old tea towel. Put all the apple stuff in it, tie it closed and weight it heavily for 48 hours. Keep it covered, you can use the stuff that drains off - this is basically apple jelly, but I would use it quite quickly rather than storing it.

Put in an airy place to dry. In humid places this probably means the fridge or hot water cupboard. Store cool and dry.

Note:
I have also experimented with making smaller 'loaves' of the cheese and this works well. Line a ceramic terrine with damp muslin, fill with apple mixture and fold the cloth over the top. Cover a piece of cardboard with a plastic bag and put that over the top. Turn upside down onto a couple of cans. Weight the top (that's the underside of the terrine) with a few big heavy cans. Drain for two days, dry and store.