Spinach With Cottage Cheese

Spinach is cooked in many different ways. Combining cottage cheese with blended spinach is one of the many famous vegetarian dishes made in Northern parts of India. This dish is served as a main course with Chapatis and Roti.

This instructable will guide you on how to make this tasty vegetarian dish at home

• Two bunches of fresh Spinach (About 500 grams)
• Cottage cheese (Paneer) 200 grams
• One medium sized onion finely chopped
• Two tomatoes diced into small pieces
• One inch long piece of Ginger, crushed
• 3 to 4 Garlic cloves, crushed
• One teaspoon of Cumin seed powder
• 3/4th teaspoon of Red chili powder (Adjust to your own taste)
• 1/4th teaspoon of Turmeric powder
• 1/4th teaspoon of Asafoetida powder
• Salt to taste
• About a tablespoon of cooking oil

• Wash and clean the spinach in running water to remove any soil particles and insects
• Cut off the stem and chop the leaves into pieces. You can feed the stems to your chicken or use it to make compost

• Place the spinach pieces In a wide mouthed vessel and add water to cover the leaves
• Boil the spinach for about five minutes
• Drain out the water using a strainer
• Keep the boiled spinach leaves aside to cool

• Transfer the boiled spinach to a mixer grinder
• Blend it to a fine paste and transfer to another bowl

• Cut the Cheese (Paneer) into half an inch cubes and keep aside

• In a flat bottomed frying pan add about a teaspoon of oil and heat over medium flame
• Once oil is heated, add the cheese cubes
• Shallow fry the cheese cubes till water content in cheese evaporates

• Place a frying pan over medium flame and add a tablespoon of cooking oil
• When oil is heated add chopped onions, crushed garlic and crushed ginger
• When raw smell of onion disappears, add diced tomato pieces
• Add all spices and salt to the pan and stir fry till the mix leaves oil

• Add the blended spinach paste to the pan and mix well
• Now you can add the lightly fried cheese cubes to the mix in the pan
• Cook over medium heat for about 3 to 4 minutes and remove from stove

In Northern parts of India, this dish is popularly known as "Palak Paneer" (Palak means Spinach and Paneer means Cottage Cheese). Palak Paneer is served as a main course with Chapatis and Flat Bread.