Paneer (Indian Cottage Cheese)

Paneer is a homemade Indian cheese. First time when i taste it, for me it's a little bit similiar to tofu but cheesy. I used to buy paneer from Indian grocery store, but it's quite expensive, so i tried to make it by my self. I thought it's hard and complicated to make paneer, but after i tried, it's easy. I had this recipe from Manjula's kitchen site.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup hot water
8 cups (half gallon) milk
1/4 cup lemon Juice

Cheese Cloth or Muslin cloth

Directions:

Boil milk, stirring occasionally

In a mean while, mix hot water and lemon juice, set a side

When it comes to boil (it starts producing bubbles and starts rising up) add lemon juice gradually and stir slowly

The milk will start to curdle

Remove from the stove

Keep stiring gently until the milk and curd has separate completly

Drain the milk using a strainer line with cheesecloth or muslin cloth.

Pour the curdled milk through the cheesecloth slowly.

The curd is what we called as paneer

Wrap paneer in a cheese cloth

Rinse under cold water

Squeeze out the excess water from the paneer as much as possible.

Press the wrapped paneer under a heavy bowl/pan for about 1 hour

Refrigerate it for minimum 1 hour to get a stiffer Paneer, so that you can easily cut into cubes