Only because I have spent many years working in restaurants and spent quite a bit of time actually talking with a vendor at the MN State fair who explained his process, I feel the need to weigh in on these reviews. The cheese curds should be fresh, at room temperature and when they at room temp, shake them around in little bit of flour to lightly coat them. When the curds are at room temperature, they "sweat" out some of the natural fat so that the flour will adhere to the curd. This step also ensures that that the batter will stick to the curds in the fryer. The batter should be made with beer, not milk and be fairly thin. Excess batter after dipping the curds should be drained from them in a wire mesh strainer (they actually had a very large flat one for this part) but a larger mesh strainer at home works too. The temperature of the oil is critical, the gentleman I spoke with said they keep their fryer at about 375 degrees. Also, the amount of oil used is very important; keep in mind that at the fairs they are using fryers that hold several gallons of oil, a home fryer uses 1.5 to 2 quarts on average so you can't fry very many at a time if you want them to turn out to be the delicious, golden, melty cheese curds we all love at the fair. I have been making these this way for 15 years or so and always get raves for these. Hope this helps anyone who has had problems with the batter sticking or everything turning into a gooey mess.
Being an expatriate Cheesehead for the first time in my life I planned a large get together for the opening Packer game this year. My roommate found a dairy in Marin County that sold cheese curds at the farmers market on Saturday's in San Francisco. She went down and picked up three pounds and I proceeded to practice the night before the game using this recipe. Much to my dismay they were not the flaky nuggets of molten cheese heaven I craved; they instead tasted like lumps of cold curd wrapped in a burnt pancake. Check out the beer batter intended for fish also found on this site and use that recipe instead: it will give you a much better taste of real Wisconsin cheese curds.
I havent tried this particular recipe but as the wife of a transplanted born and bred Wisconsinite I have learned the tricks of making cheese curds and this recipe is missing the most important step...you have to FREEZE the cheese curds after you coat them for AT LEAST an hour before you fry them!
I hoped that this recipe being from wisconsin would be an allright tasting way to make homemade cheesecurds. So I tried it out. Followed it to a tea....it tasted somewhat like burnt pancakes with a hint of cheese. I'm used to minnesota state fair cheese curds so maybe my expecations were a little lofty but these curds were way too fluffy and there was barely any cheese left after being fried. I fried them in a deep frier which shouldn't matter since they're submerged in oil either way but in the end I was left with a fluffy pancake type substance with more cheese floating in and stuck to my deep frier than were in the curds. I would not recommend this recipe to anybody unless they want a huge mess with nothing to show for it. P.S. As LIBBYWYNN said in her review "They were just like the ones at the Minnesota State Fair!!". THEY WERE NOT EVEN IN THE SAME BALLPARK OR LEAGUE AS MINNESOTA STATE FAIR CHEESE CURDS. N-O-T-H-I-N-G Close.
Cheese curds are the best carnival and fair food around. I am formerly from Minnesota and recently moved to a Southern state and they don't have cheese curds down here at fairs and carnivals. In fact no one has even heard of them! I have been searching for this recipe for a long time on the internet and am really glad I finally found it. I made them and they were a hit in our house!! Thanks for posting this recipe!!!
I made the recipe and it came out great. I used my flash fryer and never had a burnt curd.
This recipe was great! I get my cheese curds out of Elsworth WI and I've been trying to find a batter recipe. It's alot more cheeper to make it on your own than buy those expensive batter mixes. Thanks
I was a little nervous to try these as some of the reviews were negative but I am really glad I did. They were just like the ones at the Minnesota State Fair!! It was a little tricky to get the temp of the oil just right but once I did they were a breeze. Thanks for the great recipe!!!
Good recipe for fried cheese curds although I had expected them to fry up crispier...maybe it was my frying technique.
