What is the difference between cottage cheese and "Paneer" ?!
What is the difference between cottage cheese and "Paneer" ?
Is Cottage cheese, the one which you get in major grocery shops in US, the same as the traditional Indian "Paneer" ? Whats the difference, if any? How to lookup / ask for "Paneer" in the grocery stores ?
Answers:
Raj,
I have never seen it even at Indian grocery stores such as India Sweet & Spices in (Glendale) LA. (323-345-0360).
Cottage cheese formed in small or large curds is different that paneer which is made into blocks, but both are soft cheese made from milk. If absolutely desperate to make mattar paneer or sag paneer, I suppose you could use large curd cottage cheese and rinse off the whey....or just make it yourself.....
Paneer doesn't have much taste of its own, but it is used in many great dishes and can be cooked, fried or deep-fried. It is very popular in India.
It is very easy to make:
Ingredients
1) 1/2 gallon or 2 liters of full milk (fuller is better)
2) several limes (the juice is needed, vinegar can also be used)
3) (optional) some pepper or freshly chopped coriander
Method
Heat the milk until it boils. The adventurous can add a little crushed pepper or finely chopped fresh coriander to the milk when it starts to boil.
Add lime juice as soon as the milk starts to boil (turn off the heat and keep on stirring!). Add enough so that the milk curdles.
Pour everything through a muslin cloth (or use a tea-towel as I always do), rinse it with some cold water, and hang it to dry for a while (30 minutes or so).
Press the remaining paneer under a heavy pan for a while to get rid of the remaining liquid. You should have a reasonably solid cheese left after about an hour, much like firm tofu.
Cut into blocks and make into your favorite recipe
Source(s):
married to corporate chef....but before that cooked for my first husband, a professor of food science at Ohio State University who later became vice chancellor of a college in India
i don't even know what paneer is.
I've never seen Paneer in a grocery store here, only in Indian restaurants and I love it. I think you'd find cottage cheese to be quite different. The curds are bigger and it is less creamy. If you are looking for paneer, I would suggest checking with an Indian restaurant and asking where they get it.
NO COTTAGE CHEESE IS WAY DIFFERENT. JUST TAKE A CLOSE LOOK AT.
source: my parents were born in India
I think u are talking about palak paneer. no they are not the same at all go to an indian store and ask for it they will know
Cottage cheese is more like ricotta cheese really. Paneer is a cheese that has been pressed and water extracted from it, more like feta cheese. I haven't seen paneer in the US but maybe Indian grocery stores would carry it.