How is cheese made?
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Milk is mostly water, but the stuff that makes it milk is a mixture of fat and proteins. If you heat up the milk and/or add an acid (like vinegar or lemon juice) the milk curdles. All the proteins start grabbing up the fat, making little lumps of it. The milk thus separates into these lumps of fat and protein (curds) and water with a little bit of milky stuff left (whey). Next you scoop out the curds and press as much whey out as you can.
At that point, you have already have cheese (specifically a “fresh” cheese). Most cheeses go further than this. They’re either aged, cultured, or both. Aging is just letting the cheese sit around for a while. This dries it out even further and makes the result harder. Culturing is allowing specially selected bacteria or molds to grow in the cheese, which can give it unique flavors.
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