Saag Paneer, Part I - making the paneer
Saag = made with just about any leafy green thing - spinach, collards, mustard greens, kale, et cetera.
Paneer = quickie cheese with a great many uses in Indian cooking.
First, you want to make the paneer, because making it is dead simple, and not everyone has a handy Indian grocery around the corner. Also, you're making cheese! How awesome is that?
So get the best milk you can. Good milk makes delicious paneer. I suggest using whole milk, but 2% works. Hell, add in some cream if you want to. I often do. Skim milk will give you a dry, rubbery thing that dreams of one day becoming paneer. Avoid crushing its dream by not using skim milk.
Pour your milk into a pot and slowly bring it up to a gentle boil. This is going to take awhile, so be patient. Also, don't wander off thinking you'll come back to it in a couple minutes, because you won't, and then your milk with either be scalded or boil over. So keep an eye on your milk as it heats. Give it a stir every once in a while to make sure it's not sticking to the bottom of the pot. Something you *can* do while you wait is to get the acidic thing - distilled vinegar, fresh lemon or lime juice, a little citric acid water solution. It doesn't really matter; it's not going to flavour the cheese.
When your milk is at the gentle boil, slowly pour in your acid, stirring gently. Curds will begin to form quickly. Remove the pan from the heat and allow the curds to separate from the whey. Providing there are no spiders around, now's a good time to sit on a tuffet, but do not eat your curds and whey. Instead, line a strainer with cheesecloth and pour in the curds and whey. Now you have curds. Some people like to run the cloth-covered curds through cool water to make sure no acid taste lingers. I've never noticed it make a difference.
Twist the curds up in the cheesecloth to squeeze more whey out. If you like, you can hang the cloth-covered ball of cheese over the sink, a bucket, a pan, whatever, and let the remaining whey drip out. 30 minutes should be long enough for the process.
Now take your cheese, still wrapped in cloth, and put a nice, heavy weight on it to make it flatter and squeeze out a little more moisture. Leave it for another hour or two. Come back later, unwrap your paneer and cut up for cooking. Yay, cheese!
So for your paneer project, you will need milk, 3 or 4 tablespoons of lemon or lime juice (or vinegar, whatever), and cheesecloth. I don't have actual cheesecloth, but use a nice piece of skrim. Muslin is good, too, as are flour sack towels. Important note: if you use cloth from around the house, make sure it hasn't been treated with fabric softener. You don't want Spring Breeze-flavoured paneer. I promise.
A quart of milk should yield enough paneer to go with a 10 ounce thing of frozen spinach.
Another note: This dish is also known as palak paneer, 'palak' meaning 'spinach', specifically.
This entry was originally posted at Dreamwidth. There are
comments there. You may comment here or there, as you like.
Paneer = quickie cheese with a great many uses in Indian cooking.
First, you want to make the paneer, because making it is dead simple, and not everyone has a handy Indian grocery around the corner. Also, you're making cheese! How awesome is that?
So get the best milk you can. Good milk makes delicious paneer. I suggest using whole milk, but 2% works. Hell, add in some cream if you want to. I often do. Skim milk will give you a dry, rubbery thing that dreams of one day becoming paneer. Avoid crushing its dream by not using skim milk.
Pour your milk into a pot and slowly bring it up to a gentle boil. This is going to take awhile, so be patient. Also, don't wander off thinking you'll come back to it in a couple minutes, because you won't, and then your milk with either be scalded or boil over. So keep an eye on your milk as it heats. Give it a stir every once in a while to make sure it's not sticking to the bottom of the pot. Something you *can* do while you wait is to get the acidic thing - distilled vinegar, fresh lemon or lime juice, a little citric acid water solution. It doesn't really matter; it's not going to flavour the cheese.
When your milk is at the gentle boil, slowly pour in your acid, stirring gently. Curds will begin to form quickly. Remove the pan from the heat and allow the curds to separate from the whey. Providing there are no spiders around, now's a good time to sit on a tuffet, but do not eat your curds and whey. Instead, line a strainer with cheesecloth and pour in the curds and whey. Now you have curds. Some people like to run the cloth-covered curds through cool water to make sure no acid taste lingers. I've never noticed it make a difference.
Twist the curds up in the cheesecloth to squeeze more whey out. If you like, you can hang the cloth-covered ball of cheese over the sink, a bucket, a pan, whatever, and let the remaining whey drip out. 30 minutes should be long enough for the process.
Now take your cheese, still wrapped in cloth, and put a nice, heavy weight on it to make it flatter and squeeze out a little more moisture. Leave it for another hour or two. Come back later, unwrap your paneer and cut up for cooking. Yay, cheese!
So for your paneer project, you will need milk, 3 or 4 tablespoons of lemon or lime juice (or vinegar, whatever), and cheesecloth. I don't have actual cheesecloth, but use a nice piece of skrim. Muslin is good, too, as are flour sack towels. Important note: if you use cloth from around the house, make sure it hasn't been treated with fabric softener. You don't want Spring Breeze-flavoured paneer. I promise.
A quart of milk should yield enough paneer to go with a 10 ounce thing of frozen spinach.
Another note: This dish is also known as palak paneer, 'palak' meaning 'spinach', specifically.
This entry was originally posted at Dreamwidth. There are
comments there. You may comment here or there, as you like.