The best Sunday projects are the ones that fit the shape of a Sunday: started after a slow breakfast, finished or safely parked by teatime, and requiring nothing you cannot buy on the way home. Fresh cheese and a batch of kimchi are our two favourites, because one is done inside an hour and the other takes an afternoon of pleasant chopping and then quietly gets on with itself for the rest of the week.
What both have in common is a proper end point. That matters more than it sounds. A Sunday that drifts feels wasted by six o'clock, while a Sunday with a project in it feels like something happened, even if all that happened is a bowl of curds and a bag of cabbage doing its work in the fridge.
What makes a good Sunday project?
Three tests. It has to be finishable, or at least parkable, before the evening arrives. It should need only ordinary kitchen equipment plus one specialist ingredient, because nobody wants to hunt for a gadget on a Sunday. And it should reward attention without demanding constant vigilance, so you can put the radio on.
Timing is what people misjudge. A Sunday is not a whole day, it is roughly the stretch between eleven and five with lunch in the middle. Pick a project that fits that window and you will finish it. Pick one needing eight uninterrupted hours and you will be washing up in a bad mood at nine.
The one hour project: fresh cheese by teatime
Making cheese takes far less time than people believe. You warm milk, add an acid or rennet, watch it separate into solid curds and liquid whey, then drain the curds through a cloth. That is the whole principle, and the rest is detail.
Ricotta is the most forgiving first go, with gentle curds forming almost as soon as the acid goes in. Mozzarella is the crowd pleaser, done in under an hour including the theatrical stretching stage, where the hot curds turn glossy and elastic in your hands. Mascarpone is barely more work than warming cream, though the draining wants an overnight sit.
Our Beginner's Cheese Kit brings the rennet, citric acid, cheese salt and cheesecloth, plus a recipe booklet that runs roughly from easiest to hardest so you can work down it week by week. From your own kitchen you need a large stainless steel pan, a slotted spoon and a colander. Avoid cast iron, aluminium and copper, which react with the acid and can spoil both flavour and colour.
The one rule to obey: never use UHT or ultra pasteurised milk. It will not curdle, whatever you do to it, and it accounts for nearly every failed first batch. Fresh full fat supermarket milk is exactly right, and skip lactose free milk too.
The afternoon project that keeps working all week: kimchi
Kimchi is the other kind of Sunday project. The hands-on part takes an afternoon, around an hour and a half of brining plus making the paste and mixing, and then the jar does the interesting part on its own over the following days.
The method runs in five steps. Brine the cabbage: rinse a Chinese leaf cabbage, quarter it from the base, cut it into bite size pieces and soak in salted water for about an hour and a half, stirring every half hour, then rinse three times. Make the porridge by heating sweet rice flour with sugar and water until thick and shiny. Make the chilli paste by mixing the cooled porridge with minced garlic, ginger and onion, seaweed powder and Korean dried red pepper. Glove up and work the paste through the drained cabbage and sliced spring onion. Pack it into the fermentation bag, squeezing out as much air as you can, and ferment in the fridge for five to seven days.
Our Kimchi Making Kit supplies the specialist ingredients, the sweet rice flour, dried seaweed powder and Korean dried red pepper, along with gloves and a fermentation bag, and makes two big batches. From your own kitchen you need mixing bowls, a small saucepan, a chopping board and a knife. From the shop you need one Chinese leaf cabbage, salt, sugar, garlic, fresh ginger, a quarter of an onion and a couple of spring onions.
The porridge is the step that surprises people. It is the glue of the recipe, binding the paste and helping it cling to every leaf, and it wants continuous stirring over a medium heat until it is about the consistency of natural yoghurt. If it goes lumpy, keep stirring and it will come good. Cool it before the aromatics go in, and the quick way is to sit the pan in a bowl of cold water.
How do you fit both into one Sunday?
Start the kimchi first, because the brining does its work while you are busy elsewhere. Get the cabbage into the salted water, set a timer for the half hourly stir, and then make cheese while you wait. Ricotta or mozzarella slots neatly into that gap, and lunch more or less makes itself.
Come back to the cabbage when it has properly softened, which may take longer than the stated hour and a half. Rinse, mix, pack, and put the bag in the fridge. By four o'clock you have cheese for tea and a ferment underway.
Over the following week, check the bag daily. Puffing up is completely normal, it is the fermentation producing gas, so just release the pressure when it builds. Taste every few days: the flavour keeps developing across the five to seven days, mild at first and pleasingly punchy later. Once it is where you want it, it keeps around two to three weeks in the fridge, souring slowly as it goes.
What if it goes wrong?
Most Sunday project failures come down to a handful of causes, all fixable next time. Cheese that will not set is nearly always UHT milk, the wrong temperature, or rennet mixed with chlorinated tap water. Curds that vanish into milky whey mean the mixture was cut or stirred too soon or too hard.
Kimchi that does not seem to be fermenting almost always just needs more time, since speed depends on temperature, salt and the cabbage itself. Cabbage that will not soften needs longer in the brine. And a strong smell is not a problem at all, it is the sign of a healthy ferment doing exactly what it should.
Sunday project FAQs
How long does homemade cheese actually take?
Ricotta and mozzarella are both under an hour from cold milk to the table. Mascarpone needs an overnight drain, so start that one on Saturday if you want it for Sunday.
Do I need special equipment for kimchi?
No. The kit brings the specialist ingredients, gloves and a fermentation bag, and everything else is standard kitchen kit: two mixing bowls, a small saucepan, a chopping board and a knife.
Can I make kimchi less spicy?
Yes, simply add less of the dried red pepper to the paste. The kit makes two batches, so you can adjust the second one once you know how the first tasted.
Is the kimchi kit suitable for vegans?
It is. The kimchi kit is vegetarian, vegan, gluten free and lactose free, and the cheese kits are vegetarian and gluten free thanks to the vegetarian rennet.
Can I do both projects with children around?
Cheesemaking is a fine kitchen science lesson, with hot pans as the only real caution. Kimchi involves a lot of chopping and a chilli paste that stings, so hand out the gloves and keep it to the mixing.
Browse our full range of make your own kits and give next Sunday something to do.
