Tip of the Day: Spoiled milk? Make cheese

by Emily Matchar, Posted Mar 20th 2008 @ 6:00AM

Want to know what to do when your milk has started to turn?

So you go to pour milk on your Cheerios and you notice it's slightly sour. Not like, nasty, curdled chunks-spoiled, but just a bit too off to taste good in the morning with bananas. What to do?

This is when I make paneer, the versatile Indian farmer's cheese used in everything from deep fried appetizers to spicy spinach dishes to desserts. With little taste of its own, it makes a great meat substitute, taking on the flavor or whatever it's cooked with. It's essentially just boiled milk, curdled with an acidic agent (you can use vinegar, yogurt, lemon juice, etc.), with the solids strained through a cheesecloth and, if a harder consistency is desired, pressed under a hard object (I like Webster's). While spoiled milk is certainly not a requirement for making paneer, it's a good way to use up what would otherwise go down the drain, as the slight tanginess is overcome by the added acids.

Here's a simple recipe for making paneer; here's a recipe for saag paneer (a rich, creamy spinach dish with cubes of browned paneer). Enjoy!

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Filed Under: Tip of the Day, Ingredients
Tags: Cheese, cheesemaking, dairy, Indian, Milk, Paneer, south asia, spoiled milk, SpoiledMilk, what to do, WhatToDo