You can create delicious and juicy cottage cheese from regular kefir, but this liquid dairy product must be of good quality, otherwise curd protein will not curdle in it. To create 300-350 g of cottage cheese you need about 1 liter of kefir of any fat content. If you are cooking cottage cheese for children, it is best to use kefir of medium or high fat content. Cottage cheese is cooked in a water bath - this is an indispensable condition so that the milk mass does not boil or gurgle. Remember that the resulting product will need to be consumed within 24 hours, since kefir curd has a very limited shelf life. All spices, such as salt or sugar, are added after the dish is created.
You will need:
- 1 liter of kefir.
Cooking
1. If you purchased chilled kefir, let it warm up at room temperature for about 30 minutes - this will reduce the duration of heat treatment and the protein in kefir will evenly fold. In a cooled kefir in a water bath, the protein will roll off the edges, but not in the middle. Pouring kefir into a small saucepan.
2. In a saucepan of a slightly larger diameter, pour water and place a saucepan with kefir in it so that only its bottom is submerged in water. We put the design on the stove and turn on the average heat. Bring the water in a large saucepan to a boil and steam a kefir saucepan in a water bath for about 15 minutes.
3. During this time you will see that whey has stood out and the protein has completely curtailed. Gently knead the middle of the mass with a spoon to make sure that it is completely twisted, and remove the pan from the stove and from the water bath.
4. Cover the colander with a double or triple layer of gauze. At this stage, the number of layers of gauze material and its density are very important, since small particles of cottage cheese can simply “pass” through them, especially if the yogurt was of poor quality. Pour the curdled mass into a colander and leave for 5-10 minutes to drain the whole serum.
5. Then collect the gauze layer in the bag, tie up its ends and hang over the bowl or sink. Leave for 30 minutes, if you want to get juicy cottage cheese, or for 1 hour, to make the product more dry.
6. After that, carefully cut the blooming bag and place the curd in a bowl or ice cream bowl. It is completely ready to eat - you can add raisins, nuts, berries or fruits.
