Cottage Cheese
Cooking Tips
- Serve up a bowl with some fresh sliced apricot, grapes, peaches or pears.
- It is a classic substitute for ricotta in lasagna, but you can also cook other dishes with cottage cheese, including blending into dips, baking into breads and making into gratins.
Details
Cottage cheese may be found in large curd, small curd, full-fat and low-fat options. You may be able to find fresh, farm-made cottage cheese by asking around at the farmers market. When made from the milk of pastured cows, the flavor will change with the seasons due to the types and quantity of grasses and legumes the cow consumes. Organic cottage cheeses often have a more complex flavor (though cottage cheese, by definition, is mild since it’s not aged) than conventional cottage cheeses, where the cows would have been fed more grain, resulting in a watered-down flavor.
Quark cheese is sometimes categorized as cottage cheese, but they are different products.
For cooking with cottage cheese (beyond lasagna), check out this New York Times article from 2010.
Nutrition: Cottage cheese is a good source of calcium and protein. It can have relatively high calorie and fat contents per serving, but most brands also make low- or non-fat varieties. However, to compensate for the loss of flavor from the fat, sometimes these will contain added sugar. Best to stick with the full-flavor version and watch your serving size.
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