I discovered Paneer in one of my business trips to India and since then, I fell in love with any dish using this white cottage cheese. Paneer is unaged, acid-set, non-melting farmer cheese made by curdling heated milk with lemon juice or other food acid (Wikipedia).
Now, as for the Filipino twist, I added the Paneer cubes to Chicken Adobo; the cottage cheese absorbed the rich sauce from the adobo which provides a good balance overall.
I had always thought making Paneer is no easy task until an office colleague showed me how to make this delicious cheese. I was skeptical at first but true enough, it is really easy to make at home.
In this recipe, I used the popular Filipino white vinegar, "Datu Puti" to trigger the coagulation process. This vinegar is made from sugar cane and has about 4.5% acid strength. As for the fresh milk, I used 2 liters of the Japanese brand, "Meiji" milk. but any fresh milk brand will do however please do not use the low-fat kind. You also need a muslin cloth or any thin cotton cloth to separate the milk solids from the water.
The procedure in making Paneer is relatively simple:
1.) Pour the milk in a saucepan and let it boil. Gradually stir the milk as it warms up to prevent the formation of a thin film at the surface;
2.) Add vinegar 1 tbsp to another until you see the milk coagulating and separating from the water. I used 3 tbsp of white vinegar for this recipe. You can turn off the heat once you see the coagulation process complete. At this point, you will see the milk solids floating and the remaining water slightly yellowish to light green.
3.) Filter the contents of the saucepan using the muslin cloth separating the excess water from the milk solids. When all the water has been drained out, mold it like a rectangular block to shape the milk solids. Put some weight on top to compress the milk solids and also squeeze out any remaining water. Be careful not to compress too long as the Paneer could become hard. I did this for roughly 20minutes.
The whole preparation time took me less than an hour and the yield for a 2liters milk is good enough to serve a family of 6. You can store the Paneer inside the fridge or inside the freezer to last longer. As a personal rule, I always want my ingredients fresh so I encourage using and eating right away.
So far, the most common Paneer dish I find in most Indian restaurants is the Palak Paneer which is mainly mashed spinach cooked with Paneer. I had the privilege to have a live cooking demo of this dish courtesy again of my colleague (Jyotsna, many thanks and I owe you on this one!).
Here's a link to the recipe from Indian Food Forever website. There are also a lot more Paneer Indian recipes in this website which is cool to try! http://www.indianfoodforever.com/vegetables/palak-paneer.html
I also tried using Paneer when I was making a Vietnamese spring roll one day. I used rice paper to contain the spring roll and inside, I added julienned carrots, fresh mint, rice vermicelli, bean spouts, shrimp, and of course Paneer cubes. The result was fantastic!
There is no stopping how many dishes you can use and combine with Paneer. And btw, even without anything too, i find Paneer a great snack to munch and maybe next time, I will experiment on flavoring the milk curd itself.
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