Paneer/Cottage Cheese

Paneer/Cottage Cheese - A delicious and nutritious food with the goodness of both protein and calcium that one must include in their diet regularly. 

Ingredients - 

1 litre milk

1 large sized lemon

Method -

1. Take a pan and add milk to it and keep the flame medium and stir it often.

2. By the time milk is getting heated let's do some important preparations-

1. Squeeze the lemon juice and keep it ready for curdling the milk.

2. Keep the muslin cloth ready for straining purpose.

3. Have a bottle full of chilled water. For rinsing the paneer.

3. Once the milk starts to boil,  immediately start adding lemon juice and keep stiring the milk slowly while adding lemon juice to it.

4. You will get to see the milk starts curdling. Milk and whey will be separated. At this stage switch off the flame and immediately strain the water and collect the paneer in a muslin cloth or you can use a clean handkerchief.

5. Wash the collected paneer with chilled water 2-3times to get rid of the lemon juice smell and then tie the muslin cloth and squeeze the excess water from it.

6. Next place the paneer (wrapped in cloth) on a strainer/flat wooden board and keep any weighing object on it and leave it for about an hour. 

7. Now unwrap the cloth and you will get nice round flat shaped paneer. Cut it into small cubes and enjoy it by adding it to various dishes that you like.

Note:

1. Use full fat cow/buffalo milk for making paneer.

2. You can use 1/2 cup curd or 2-3 spoons vinegar to curdle the milk.

3. You can store this paneer in an air tight container and can be used for about 3-4days.

4. Do not continue to boil once the milk curdles completely.

5. Do not boil the milk once it is curdled and whey is separated. Also you can add ice-cubes immediately into the pan once the milk is curdled and then strain and wash the paneer with chilled water to get soft paneer.

6. Weighing object can be anything like you can fill a pot with grains/water and place it over the paneer.