In a heavy bottomed stainless steel pot, take milk and add citric acid.
Mix it thoroughly until the citric acid dissolves.
Now heat the milk on medium flame until it reaches 88°F.
When mixing you can see that the milk has started to curdle.
Mix rennet to 3 tbs of water and keep it ready.
Add it to the milk once it reaches 88°F.
Mix it gently for 4-5 times to make sure that it is completely dissolved in milk.
Heat it on low flame until milk reaches 105°F.
Stir it once or twice in between. By now the milk would have formed a mass.
Remove from flame and let it sit on counter for 5-10 minutes.
Place a colander on top of a bowl and transfer the curds to the colander. Do not throw away the whey collected. We need it for the next step.
Once all the curds have been collected in the colander, press it gently and allow it to drain for 10-15 minutes.
Now transfer the curd to a chopping board and cut into 1" cubes.
Add salt to whey and mix. Take 1/3rd of the whey collected in a bowl and transfer remaining whey to the stainless steel pot.
Heat the whey in the pot until it reaches 180°F.
Now take half the curds in a bowl and add the hot whey.
Let it sit for 5 minutes. Take a piece of the whey and try to stretch. If you can stretch, the cheese is ready to be shaped. But if it just breaks, then it need to soak in hot water a little more.
If you feel that the water is cool, then add hot water from the pan to the cheese and let it soak until it stretches.
If you could bear heat you can do the stretching with bare hands, but if not, wear gloves and handle the cheese.
Take the cheese and stretch it. Then fold it into two. Again stretch it. Repeat stretching and folding for 7-8 times until the cheese is smooth. To make it easy, keep on dipping it in hot water and then stretch.
Once it is nice and smooth, shape it into a ball and drop it into the 1/3 room temperature whey.
Do it with the remaining cheese also.
Let the cheese remain in water for 30 minutes.
Remove from whey and use it immediately or wrap it in two or three layers of cling film and refrigerate.
Use it with in 2-3 days.
