How to make melted cheese at home. Homemade processed cheese from cottage cheese: a recipe for Slavic cuisine

Today I would like to offer a recipe for making homemade cream cheese from cottage cheese. Such products, probably, are not prepared so often at home, but in vain. Home-made melted cheese turns out to be very tasty, deliciously tender, and if spices and additional ingredients are added during the cooking process, its taste will become spicy.
I would like to note that the most common “ingredients” that can be purchased at a store located near your home are perfect for preparing this product.
Homemade processed homemade cheese is much healthier than store-bought because it is natural, you know that it does not contain various E-shki, preservatives and other fillers. Soups can be prepared from homemade processed cheese, sandwiches, pita bread can be lubricated with it, it can be added to salads and various snacks. Cottage cheese for processed cheese is better to use homemade, fatty, the taste of cooked cheese depends on its quality.

Taste Info Various Snacks

Ingredients

milk (fat content 3.2%) - 1/2 l;
cottage cheese - 350-400 g;
butter- 100 g;
baking soda - 1/2 tsp;
any vegetable oil - 1/2 tsp;
salt (preferably fine) - 1/2 tbsp. l.

How to make homemade cream cheese from cottage cheese

Pour milk into a small saucepan or saucepan and place over medium heat.

Heat until bubbles form, but do not let it boil. As soon as bubbles begin to form on the surface of the milk, add the curd.

From this moment on, it is impossible to be distracted from the process; constantly stir the contents of the saucepan.
The curd will start curdling after 4-5 minutes.

As soon as the curd has curdled, and whey has formed in addition to it in a saucepan, turn off the fire.
Pour the curd-milk mixture into a colander, previously covered with two layers of gauze, then hang the mass, allowing the excess liquid to drain.

Melt the butter in a saucepan or saucepan or frying pan.

Add salt, soda and mix thoroughly, carefully introduce the cottage cheese.

The process of cooking processed cheese lasts 13-15 minutes, all this time you need to continuously mix the contents.

After a while, the mass will begin to thicken, when it ceases to resemble cottage cheese, it's time to remove the stewpan from the heat. Cool the cheese a little, and then transfer it to a pre-prepared form, which is recommended to be lightly oiled. Gently level the surface with a spatula or tablespoon

Let cool slightly and refrigerate for 3-5 hours.

Home processed cheese ready and ready to be eaten.

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Homemade processed cheese "Yantar"

What kind of sandwich cheese you can’t take from the store shelf, regardless of the price, the composition will scare you at worst, at best it will confuse you with a mass of incomprehensible words. BUT homemade cheese- here it is, made from natural cottage cheese (you can heat it yourself from farm kefir), plus soda, on which your mother used to bake cookies as a child ... Just a wonderful product: such home-made cheese can be spread on a bun for children at school, and in cheese add soup. How would your husband rate it? In general, the recipe is simple - read, memorize and cook!

You need:

500 g of cottage cheese (sour-milk, without "chemistry" - this is important),
1 teaspoon soda
a pinch of salt
0.5 teaspoon "Provencal" or "Italian herbs".

Amber type cheese recipe step by step

Prepare cottage cheese (in this case, it was heated at home from kefir). The cheese should not be too watery, so before “melting” it sagged for 20 minutes in a metal sieve so that the whey is glass.

Now build a device for a water bath. As a rule, two pans are taken: one is larger, the other is smaller. Water is poured into the first, another pan is placed in this water. Place the cheese in the second saucepan, rubbing it a little with a spoon from lumps. Add soda.

Put the pots on the fire. When the water in the lower container boils, the curd will begin to melt. Do not go far, stir it - and at the same time keep an eye on whether everything is fine with it and whether lumps remain in the cheese. If you have boiled homemade Yantar for about 10 minutes, but grains and grains of cottage cheese are still present in it, add another pinch of soda.

The melted cheese should be about this consistency.

When the cheese seems homogeneous to you, that is, it reaches the desired melted consistency, salt it and add aromatic herbs.

Everything, now it can be removed from the water bath and quickly (it will immediately begin to solidify) transferred to the prepared tray.

Well, when it has cooled down completely, take the tray to the refrigerator - it can be stored there for up to five days ... If it “lives” for so long, of course.

It's not only great option for sandwiches, but also a whole field for experimentation. Yes, for example, instead of "Italian herbs" you can add to cheese: pieces of red hot pepper(fresh or dried); dill, salt and garlic; mushrooms fried with onions; finely chopped ham ... But such cheese is not very suitable for baking - it melts too quickly, and burns instead of an appetizing crust (unless you add it five minutes before the dish is ready).

Good luck! And delicious sandwiches!

Real melted cheese at home! It prepares very quickly. A minimum of products and time - and here you are on the table cream cheese, not worse than the store, but even better. It melts in a water bath, and the soda, which is part of the ingredients, helps it acquire that very plasticity without affecting the taste. It can be done with different flavorings. I have this time with mushrooms. I made a double norm of cheese (it is very tasty), you can reduce it by half

Products:

Curd 1 kg
Butter 200 g
Chicken egg 2 pcs.
Baking soda 1 tsp
Salt 1 tsp

Place cottage cheese, butter, eggs, soda and salt in one bowl.

Blend well with a blender until creamy.

Pour water into a saucepan with a larger diameter than the one with cottage cheese. Place a bowl of curd mixture on top. Put this structure on fire. This is a water bath. When the water boils, boil the cheese for 15 minutes. Stir occasionally.

The mass will melt and become slightly viscous. If it is liquid like milk, then add a pinch of soda and continue to cook. If again liquid, then add more soda. Just be careful! Don't ruin the taste of the cheese.

Wash the mushrooms and cut into cubes.

Pour some into the pan vegetable oil and fry the mushrooms on it. Salt. Drain the oil from the cooked mushrooms

Add mushrooms to cheese and stir. As it cools, the cheese will thicken.

Homemade melted cheese 2

You can cook a lot of homemade processed cheese, it is stored in the refrigerator for a long time, so you will enjoy sandwiches with natural delicious processed cheese for more than 1 day.

Ingredients:

400 g cottage cheese
50 g butter
1 egg
1 teaspoon of soda
salt to taste
spices to taste

Cooking:

1. Cottage cheese, preferably homemade, is rubbed with a spoon through a sieve. In theory, it is possible through a meat grinder, but it seemed to me that it would be more tender this way. Yes, that's how it was in the old recipe.
2. Then add the egg, butter, soda, salt to the cottage cheese.

3. We put the cauldron with this mixture on a small fire and begin to knead it all with a spoon until a homogeneous mass. Along the way, add spices - I sprinkled dried basil. If you want to give the processed cheese a yellowish color, add turmeric.
4. Stir continuously until the mass is completely melted and the first bubbles appear. If overexposed on fire, water may begin to separate and melted cheese will turn out to be similar in consistency to cheese.

5. Pour the mass into a bowl, let it cool. Melted cheese is ready. I note that the quality of cottage cheese is very important. If the melted cheese is too runny, try adding cream next time.

Add greens and eat healthy!

Homemade processed cheese without eggs

Melted cheese for spreading on a sandwich, for cheese soup, for casseroles. The recipe is the basis, since there are quite a few variations, and having mastered the basic method, you yourself will be able to invent “cheeses” for your family. Sweet, spicy, whatever you like. In my case, this is not salted cheese.

Cooking curd cheese takes some time, but it is not necessary to be near it all the time. I approached the cottage cheese six times, three of which were pure curiosity.

Ingredients:

fat-free cottage cheese - 200 gr.
baking soda - half a teaspoon
milk - 2 tbsp. spoons
seasonings as desired

Cottage cheese, if dry, can be moistened with milk and slightly rubbed-beat with a fork (I did this right in the bowl in which I then warmed the whole mass in a water bath). Pour soda, mix well again and leave for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes you will see that the texture curd mass is already starting to melt.

We rearrange the container with cottage cheese in a water bath, mix again and go about our business. On a small fire, the cottage cheese will languish, thicken, bubble, you can mix it a couple more times with a fork. Wait until the grains dissolve, the mass becomes homogeneous, add spices, sweets, spices to the curd as desired. Hold in the bath for a few more minutes so that the spices disperse, transfer the mass into a jar, cool.

I met information that not any cottage cheese melts, I took natural sour-milk cottage cheese of zero fat content, and not “ curd product with herbal supplements.

Homemade cheese from cottage cheese is prepared quite easily. But in order for such milk product It turned out really tasty, you should strictly follow all prescription requirements. That is why we decided to devote the presented culinary article to this topic.

General information

Eating wholesome and natural food is a completely natural desire of absolutely any person. But, unfortunately, in our time to find such products is quite difficult. In this regard, experienced chefs recommend preparing some ingredients on their own. In this article, we will talk in detail about how to make cheese at home. In addition, several recipes will be presented to your attention. different varieties this tasty and nutritious product.

How to make homemade cottage cheese step by step

It is no secret to anyone that the preparation of this product requires special culinary knowledge. After all, without experience and skill, you are unlikely to succeed. delicious cheese, even with detailed recipe. But if you do not have the proper knowledge, then we will try to facilitate its cooking method as much as possible. Only in this way you can please your family with the most delicious creamy product which they did on their own.

So, to make homemade cheese from cottage cheese, we need:

cow's milk (it is desirable to purchase fatty country milk) - about 500 ml;
cottage cheese coarse-grained fat (should be taken rustic) - about 500 g;
butter - about 50 g;
salt, as well as table soda - ½ dessert spoon each.

Cooking process

Where to begin? As you can see, a homemade cheese recipe does not require the use of a huge variety of ingredients. And to cook it, it is not at all necessary to specially go to the hypermarket. After all, you can buy all these products in the nearest market. It is good if these components are exclusively of rural origin. After all, as you know, it is from such products that the most delicious, aromatic and healthy cheeses are obtained.

To make homemade cheese from cottage cheese on your own, the mentioned coarse-grained ingredient should be put in a large container and thoroughly rubbed with a tablespoon. Next, you need to add boiling milk to it, and then put on a small fire and, stirring regularly, cook for about 10 minutes. If you want to finished product turned out to be as hard as possible, then the named time can be slightly increased (by about 4-6 minutes).

After the specified period, the contents of the dishes must be put in a colander or sieve, on which two-layer gauze must first be put on. After all the liquid has drained (after about 1 minute), the edges of the fabric must be lifted and the resulting mass strongly squeezed out of all remaining moisture.

After all the steps described, put the semi-finished homemade cottage cheese cheese into a clean saucepan, add salt, soft butter and table soda to it, and then keep it on low heat for about 2 minutes. In this case, the mass should be constantly stirred.

When the cheese begins to move away from the walls of the dish, it must be removed from the heat and allowed to cool at room temperature. At the end, the finished milk mass should be given the necessary shape, put in a glass or ceramic container, pre-lubricated with oil, and then put in the refrigerator for 50-80 minutes.

How to use correctly?

The presented cheese recipe at home will allow you to make a solid dairy product that can be used during cooking. various dishes. So, pizza and sandwiches are very tasty from it. It should also be noted that such a product melts remarkably in the oven.

Processed homemade cheese: cottage cheese recipe

Surely there are few people who are indifferent to store processed cheese. But, unfortunately, this product, produced by various companies, is very often flavored with all kinds of thickeners and preservatives that adversely affect human body. In this regard, we recommend that you make your own homemade processed cheese from cottage cheese. It should be noted that this product is quite simple to manufacture. Moreover, not only you, but also your children will like it.

To independently make homemade processed cheese from cottage cheese, you need to purchase:

cottage cheese coarse-grained rustic fat - 500 g;
butter - about 100 g;
rustic chicken egg - 1 pc.;
salt, as well as table soda - 1 and ½ of a dessert spoon, respectively.

How to cook?

How to make this dish? We talked about how to make homemade hard cheese from cottage cheese above. But in order to prepare a processed dairy product, you have to proceed a little differently. To do this, you need to take a small saucepan, put all the above ingredients into it one by one and beat well until smooth with a mixer.

After the described actions, the resulting mixture must be placed in a water bath. For those who do not know what it is, we will describe this process in more detail: you need to take a large enameled basin, pour ordinary drinking water into it (fill it by about 1/3 part), and then put a metal bowl with cheese mass on it.

It is necessary to turn on a strong fire so that the water in a large container boils, and the contents of a small container must be stirred regularly. It is desirable to carry out this procedure for about 5-7 minutes. Next, you need to generously grease a glass or ceramic container with butter and pour homemade processed cheese into it.

Finished dairy product It is advisable to leave in the refrigerator for 12 hours. During this time, it should completely harden, but at the same time remain a little soft.

How to present correctly?

Now you know how homemade processed cheese is prepared. The cottage cheese recipe that was presented above may include not only the mentioned coarse-grained product, but also other ingredients. For example, self-made cheese is very tasty, to which fresh herbs, ham or mushrooms are added. You can use this product in any form. Very often it is added to pizza, salads and other hearty dishes that need to be baked in the oven.

Cooking fat-free cheese at home

Homemade cheese from fat-free cottage cheese it is recommended to cook for those who suffer from obesity, but cannot refuse such a dairy product. Moreover, those beautiful ladies who want not only to maintain their refined forms, but also their own health can use the recipe below. After all, as you know, fatty foods negatively affect the entire human vascular system.

So, the cheese recipe at home includes the following ingredients:

skimmed milk - about 2 liters;
freshly squeezed lemon juice - ¼ cup;
fine sugar - a small pinch;
medium-sized salt - ½ dessert spoon.

As you can see, all products are available to everyone.

Fast cooking method

Homemade cheese from cottage cheese, the calorie content of which does not exceed 200 energy units per 100 g, is prepared very quickly and easily. To create such a product, you need to take a large saucepan and pour all the skimmed milk into it. Next, you need to put the dishes on a small fire and heat the contents to 80 °. At the same time, it is highly not recommended to boil the dairy product.

After the liquid becomes warm, you need to add sugar and salt to it. After mixing the ingredients, you need to pour freshly squeezed lemon juice into them. These ingredients will help curdle the dairy product. So, white flakes should appear in it. After that, the saucepan must be removed from the heat and left aside (at room temperature) for about 30-35 minutes.

To make homemade cheese from cottage cheese, the contents of the dishes should be thrown onto multi-layer gauze and allowed to drain all the liquid. Moreover, the less moisture there is, the harder the product will turn out. After all the described actions, the head of homemade cheese should be put in a bowl or bowl and placed in the refrigerator.

Proper serving at the dinner table

How to serve fat-free homemade cheese to the table? The cottage cheese recipe that we presented above includes a minimum of inexpensive products. And this means that you can cook diet cheese at least every day. After it hardens in the refrigerator, it should be cut into thin slices and presented to the table along with pieces of dark bread. By the way, such a product can also be used to prepare delicious dietary salads from fresh vegetables.

Cooking goat cheese at home

Homemade goat cheese is considered the healthiest. After all, the mentioned product contains a huge amount of proteins (more than cow's milk), and is also better absorbed and easier to digest by the body. It should be especially noted that it is quite difficult to find pure goat cheese in stores. That is why we suggest you make it yourself. But for this you need to purchase the following products:

natural goat's milk - about 2 liters;
table vinegar - 4 large spoons;
cumin - add to taste and desire;
medium-sized salt - about 40 g.

Cooking process

Making delicious and healthy cheese using natural goat milk is not as difficult as it seems at first glance. However, it should be noted that such a process requires special care.

So, first you need to remove the top layer of heavy cream from the dairy product, and then pour it into a saucepan and put on medium heat. After the milk begins to boil, the temperature must be immediately reduced to the minimum value. Next, add to the liquid table vinegar. This should contribute to the rapid folding of the dairy product, that is, the preparation of goat curd.

As soon as a lot of white flakes form in the pan, the dishes should be immediately removed from the heat. In the future, the resulting cottage cheese must be transferred to gauze and allowed to drain completely. For the effectiveness of this procedure, it is advisable to hang the gauze bag over any dishes or sink.

Exactly 24 hours later, the cheese mass must be removed, salted, seasoned with caraway seeds and kneaded well, like dough. Next, from the resulting mixture, it is necessary to form a cake and put it in a pan. In this case, the dishes should be put on a fairly slow fire. Thus, the cheese will gradually melt, and then become thick again. After the dairy product has acquired the desired consistency, it must be cut into pieces. While the cheese has not cooled, it should be given any desired shape.

Making delicious cheese with spices

As you can see, making homemade cheese from cottage cheese is not very difficult. But if you want this product to be as tasty and fragrant as possible, it is recommended to make it using various spices.

So, in order to make such cheese on our own, we need:

goat natural milk - about 2 liters;
thick sour cream - about 350 g;
country eggs with saturated yolk - 3 pcs.;
fine salt - 3 large spoons;
dried basil - 2 dessert spoons;
dried garlic - 1 dessert spoon;
dried dill - 1 dessert spoon.

Cooking spicy cheese

As you noted above, the preparation of various cheeses takes place in several stages. To begin with, you should strain the goat's milk through a strainer in order to maximally rid it of any possible dirt present. Next, you need to break everything chicken eggs and mix them together with sour cream. To make the mass as homogeneous as possible, we recommend using a mixer.

After the done actions, salt should be added to the sour cream-egg mixture and put it in milk. Without ceasing to stir for a second, all the ingredients need to be gradually brought to a boil. As a result, you should get a mass with large flakes.

After heat treatment the contents of the pan must be poured into a colander, on which multilayer gauze should be laid in advance. After straining the product, it is necessary to add dried herbs (dill and basil) and garlic to it. In conclusion, the cheese mass must be tightly tied in cheesecloth and hung so that the remaining milk is completely glass.

After a few hours, when you have a dry curd clot left, you should put it in a deep bowl (directly in the fabric), and place some heavy object on top (for example, filled with water three-liter jar). In this position, the cheese must be placed in a refrigerator, where it is desirable to keep it for about 12-14 hours.

It should be especially noted that such a fragrant product can be made not only from goat's milk, but also from cow's milk.

Cooking brynza at home

Brynza is perhaps the only cheese that goes perfectly with fresh vegetables and herbs. To prepare it, we need:

cow's milk with a fat content of 3.2% - 1 l;
thick sour cream 20% - 3 large spoons;
freshly squeezed lemon juice - about 2 large spoons;
fine salt - a dessert spoon.

Step by step description of the cooking method

In order for you to get delicious homemade cheese (brynza), you must strictly follow all the described requirements of the recipe. For this, it is not necessary to purchase village products. Ingredients can also be bought at a regular store.

So, to prepare such cheese, you need to pour milk into a saucepan, and then put it on a strong fire. Next, in the dishes you need to put thick sour cream and mix everything thoroughly. After about 7 minutes, the liquid will begin to heat up. In this case, flakes should form in the pan. As soon as the curdling process begins, freshly squeezed lemon juice should be poured into the milk. After mixing the ingredients with a spoon, they should be boiled for another minute. Within this short time, the whey should finally separate.

After the described actions, the resulting product must be filtered. To do this, it must be discarded in a colander, on which multilayer gauze must first be placed. As soon as all the moisture from the cheese mass is gone, it must be salted to taste, put in a bowl and set under oppression. And the heavier the weight, the better the cheese will turn out.

After one hour, the product should be removed from the press. Then it must be put in a plastic bag and placed in the refrigerator. Homemade cheese is ready.

Proper use of the home product

As mentioned above, homemade cheese should be kept under oppression for no more than one hour. This is due to the fact that the final product you should get is not hard, but soft and with a small amount salt moisture. After a short exposure in the refrigerator, the cheese should be cut into small cubes. Next, they need to be beautifully placed on a freshly prepared salad from raw vegetables. By the way, for juiciness, some housewives additionally soak such a product in salt brine. However, we do not recommend doing this, since the cheese can quite easily fall apart and turn into a liquid slurry.

In order for you to get the most delicious and nutritious homemade cheese, you must follow all the requirements of the above recipes. Moreover, we recommend that you listen to the following tips.

The milk used to make cheese should be as fresh as possible.
The ingredients that you plan to additionally add to the cheese mass should be prepared in advance.
To get a hard cheese that will cut well on the board, you should use the heaviest oppression.
Homemade cheeses can be used to prepare any dish, including salads, pizzas and various sandwiches.

On the shelves of stores, the choice of processed cheeses is huge, and often the hands themselves reach for a box with delicious butter cream. However, looking at the impressive composition of the product, interest in it quickly fades. We offer you to study the recipe that will tell you how to cook melted cheese at home. For some, this procedure will seem extremely difficult, but believe me, making it is not difficult at all and not for long, so let's look at the intricacies of preparing this dish.

From what, from what, from what is our melted cheese made. The name of this product speaks for itself - yes, yes, in order to get it, the raw materials that form the basis of cheese simply need to be melted. This is what happens in industrial production.

Most regular cheese, for example, tilsit or emmental, melt, add butter, powdered milk, salt melters (additives E so frightening us) and water.

And this is the composition of a good quality product made at the enterprise of conscientious manufacturers. One can only imagine what powders and E-checks are added to cheeses that are cheaper and are produced by no one knows who and where.

But do-it-yourself processed cheese can even be consumed without fear. Small child, because it contains only natural and even very useful ingredients.

At home, we simply do not have those additives that are so necessary for factory-made cheese to enhance taste, increase production volumes, and even non-stick to foil!

So, homemade processed cheese consists of the most banal, but very useful product- from cottage cheese or from milk with the addition of cottage cheese! And soda is used as a melting agent. It's all so simple as genius.

Making this product must have always seemed difficult. technological process, which can only be implemented in production shops with a bunch of automated equipment and dosing equipment.

But we assure you that every housewife has everything in her kitchen that is needed for its preparation. And the process itself takes about half an hour, taking into account all the culinary procedures. Our step by step recipe will tell you how to easily and quickly get delicious processed cheese.

Homemade melted cottage cheese

Ingredients

- 100 g + -
- 500 g + -
- 2 pcs. + -
— 1 pinch or to taste + -
Soda - 1 tsp (or 5 g) + -

homemade melted cheese recipe

First, let's prepare the kitchen utensils.

We will need:

blender or mixer;
a pot of boiling water on the stove - for melting cheese in a water bath;
container for whipping all the ingredients. It should be noted that this container should be conveniently placed on the pan above the water bath;
heat-resistant containers for the finished product.

We put the cottage cheese in a container and break it with a blender so that there is no such situation that the curd grain in homemade cheese does not melt. You can, however, wipe through a sieve or pass through a meat grinder, why not. Whipped cottage cheese turns out to be very thick in consistency, almost like plasticine.
Add butter and eggs to the curd. Pour soda and a pinch of salt, as well as, if desired, spices. Beat with a blender until smooth.
Now we place the container with the resulting mixture over boiling water in a saucepan and stir constantly. Melting time takes about 5 - 10 minutes. When the mixture is completely melted and becomes like liquid processed cheese, pour it into the prepared container.

After cooling, the product is ready for use. In total, it turns out about 700 g, not so little, you see.

As you can see, it is very easy to cook melted cheese at home under conditions, the main thing is that there should be more crispy bread at home, on which all this splendor can be spread. And as soon as the cheese is over, you can easily cook it again.

Processed cheese: recipe from milk

If for some reason your family does not eat eggs, you can make cheese for your family from milk, provided that you can’t do without cottage cheese in this recipe. And how to make this product at home with your own hands, we will tell you.

Ingredients:

Butter room temperature- 100 g;
Fatty milk - 1 l;
Cottage cheese (preferably homemade) - 1 kg;
Soda - 1 tsp;
Salt - 1 tsp;

Of course, gourmets will also find their chips. You can add any seasonings to your taste in such cheese: paprika, dried garlic, black or red ground pepper, finely chopped greens. Yes, even finely chopped ham, pickles or fried mushrooms. In general, whatever your heart desires.

When you want to cook a dish with cheese, the cook usually needs to melt it and combine it with other ingredients. How to melt cheese, in this case, is a key issue. Lit is best to avoid cheeses that form stringy fibers when heated (emmental, mozzarella and cheddar), and if you want to use cheese, it is advisable to grate it on a fine grater.
However, the most important task: do not overcook.

Cheese starts to melt at:

from 55 °С for soft cheeses;
65°C for cheddar, gruyère and emmental;
up to 82 ° C for hard dry: parmesan or pecorino.

At this temperature, the proteins that bind the texture of the cheese begin to break down, making the cheese soft and fluid. ( Hard cheeses melt longer because they have less moisture and the proteins are more tightly bound together, so the cheese does not flow as easily.) However, if the temperature is too high above the melting point of the cheese, the proteins will begin to condense, clump and force out the fat (similar to how water is squeezed out of towels), and the cheese will delaminate, become grainy and oily. That is why it is very important to monitor the cooking temperature. Cheese should be heated as little as possible. Next, you need to add it to the dish at the very end and make sure that it does not boil in any case.

How to prevent cheese from exfoliating:

A chef has several ingredients in his arsenal - a secret weapon in the fight to keep the cheese from separating and separating the fat. The main role among them is played by acidic foods, such as white wine and lemon juice, as well as starches such as flour and cornstarch. Yes, in fondue recipe a mixture of grated cheese and cornstarch is added to a pot of warmed wine and lemon juice and beat until smooth. I usually try to avoid using starch because it can dull the flavor of a dish, but in some cases the benefits it brings outweigh the downsides.

There is another substance that melts cheese when heated and combines with other ingredients more effectively, but it is sold in pharmacies, not grocery stores. This substance is sodium citrate, which doctors use as an anticoagulant, but its ability to thin the liquid is well known in the food industry.

Melting cheese into a nice, flowing mass is also difficult because when the cheese melts, the casein protein and calcium it contains react with each other and form a tangle of rope-like fibers. But if you add sodium citrate to this mixture, it will turn calcium into tiny particles, and the reaction will not start. Therefore, food manufacturers add sodium citrate when making processed cheese for better meltability.

The same principle can be used to melt cheese into a perfectly pourable sauce, such as in a macaroni and cheese and cauliflower recipe. Just do not overdo it, otherwise the dish will become bitter.

How to make cheese sticky

However, in some recipes - in dishes such as fondue or toast with cheese - it is precisely this property of cheese that is important, such as the ability to stretch with fibers and form viscous streaks, as if from Dali's canvases. However, in this case, it is also important to carefully monitor the temperature: if heated too much, the cheese will flow rather than become elastic and viscous; if it is too weak, it will remain too hard.

Another secret to getting viscous fibers: you need to stir the cheese while heating - so the proteins are distributed evenly and create the desired texture. Readiness of cheese is easy to determine. When it is whipped, from time to time you need to check how well the cheese is stretched by the fibers.

For some dishes, it is precisely the strongly stretching cheese that is suitable, and trying to give it the maximum ability to stretch can be turned into an interesting game.

Before serving a dish with cheese, it is very important to taste it before adding salt. The cheese often already has enough salt and acid, so additional salt may not be needed.