sour milk

I bought some milk the other day and when I arrived home it was leaking. So I put it in another container and obviously haven't used it fast enough. It just went off, no curdles just not nice enough to drink alone.

So in memory of my war time grandma... what should I do with it? It seems a waste to throw it out when it han't gone "that" bad... perhaps some pudding?

Ideas??

Just in case anyone thinks using sour milk is weird 


Dear Uncle Ezra,
When I was a kid, whenever we had sour milk, my mom would use up the sour milk in cookie recipes.  These cookies were thick and cakey and very tasty.  I recently had some sour milk, and I found a couple of recipes that used sour milk, so I made them, and they too, were cakey and delicious.  What is it about sour milk that gives cookies this quality?  Buttermilk when added to cake recipes makes for a nice moist cake. Does sour milk do a similar kind of thing to cookie recipes?  Do any of the Cornell faculty who know a lot about food have the answer to this question? A niece who likes to cook.

Dear cookie-cooker,

I like those cookies, too -- never let sour milk go to waste. I asked Food Science Professor Kathryn J. Boor, who says that "sour milk adds an extra leavening capability to a recipe that fresh milk, alone, cannot accomplish.  Leavening requires the appropriate release of carbon dioxide bubbles ('appropriate' refers to release of the right quantity of bubbles, at the right time).  Leavening greatly affects the texture of a cake or cookies -- and will help determine if the final product is highly dense or 'light'.  Sour milk is commonly added to a recipe along with baking soda -- together, these ingredients form the leavening reactions in cakes and cookies.  For baking soda to release carbon dioxide (the bubbles that cause the cake to rise), a batter or dough must contain natural acid.  Sour milk provides the appropriate acid to allow this reaction to occur.  (Baking powder contains baking soda AND an acid, so the dough or batter does not need to have another form of acid added to it.  Most recipes that call for sour milk will use baking soda rather than baking powder)."

Here's a website for sour milk recipes: http://www.cooks.com/rec/story/121/). For the cookies:

Ingredients

1 cup shortening 2 cups sugar 2 eggs 4 cups flour 1 cup sour milk or milk with 1 1/2 tsp vinegar mixed in 1 tsp salt 1 1/2 tsp baking soda 2 tsp cream of tarter 2 tsp vanilla
Instructions
Cream sugar and shortening, add eggs and vanilla. Mix flour, salt, baking soda, and cream of tarter. Add dry ingredients alternately with milk.

Chill several hours or overnight, roll and cut out with cookie cutters.

Bake at 400F for 10 minutes. Cool and decorate as desired.

Funny you should ask because I just made my Great-Great grandmother's Devil's food cake with sour milk.

4 heaping tablespoons cocoa
1/2 cup butter
Pour 1 cup boiling water over this.

Sift together dry ingredients
2 Cups sugar
2 cups flour
1-1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt

Beat well together 2 eggs and 1 Cup sour milk.

Add chocolate mixture to eggs and milk, beat until smooth and then add entire mixture to dry ingredients and mix well. 

Bake 350 for 30 min in 8x8 square cake pan.

awesome thanks! and I think I have all those ingredients... although I will need to pop to the store to get fresh milk for the week!! I will give it a try!

Thanks Mrs Pink's Great-Great Grandmother! That recipe was so easy! I will let you know how it turns out in 30 minutes!

Great recipe. Unfortunately my oven wasn't hot enough and the middle didn't cook all the way through.    

Thanks!

Nuts!  I had the same problem, and mine turned out kind of dry around the edges.  I'm still getting used to this oven and it was my first time baking it in the UK.  It still gets eaten though.. 

Also, is cocoa different here?  The cake tastes different than it did in North America.

 Yes cocoa is different in the UK then in the States.   It seems more mild to me.   What brand do you use, Cadbury's?

I use a fair trade cocoa from Africa... tastes like the stuff I used in Kenya.

good to know.  I'll get that next time!