I really wonder if Anya von Bremzen, the author of Please to the Table, has ever actually followed her recipe using American ingredients. I rather suspect she just published a Russian recipe and forgot to modify it.
Traditionally, tvorog is made with raw milk which has been allowed to sour naturally. Usually, the right bacteria take over, but by no means always. One can speed things along by adding traditionally made sour cream, which, of course, is also made with raw milk. Now, in America and most 'western' countries, milk sold in most places is usually pasteurised, with no active bacteria present. Sour cream is made by inoculating pasteurised milk with the right bacterial mix, but the resulting product is then pasteurised again and is quite dead. So, given the above ingredients and nothing else, it is virtually impossible to make good sour cream or tvorog. Whatever bacteria eventually take over will be almost certainly not the right kind. So, if you can't find raw milk products, you will first have to find some active bacterial culture, whether of the sour cream or the kefir kind, and use it as a starter.
BTW, tvorog is really better compared to farmer's cheese; it bears little resemblance to cottage cheese.
Just smell it and, if that doesn't provide the answer, taste it - you'll know soon enough.
Victor
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