The Vegan Paneer

In my quest to find vegan ingredients, i embarked on an adventure to learn how to make paneer from peanuts. Yes you heard me right , its a paneer made from peanuts. I decided to take this chance with my sister so I would like to dedicate this blog to my amazing sister who inspired me to work on this recipe. This was the outcome of the very first trial and i must admit i am quite pleased with the results here. Follow the simple steps below and you can have your very own peanut paneer. This paneer can be used to prepare any curry by itself or sandwiches or even to grate and garnish other recipes to enhance their flavor by providing a rich and earthy contrasting base flavor.

Preparation:

1. First soak 2 handfuls of peanuts overnight. After about 10 to 12 hours wash it thoroughly. 2. Now grind it in a very fine paste by adding little water. 3. Put the paste into a large saucepan and add 1.5 litres of water. 4. Cook it on low heat for 10-15 mins. Remember that we do not have to boil it just cook it on low flame and keep stirring continuously. 5. Turn off the heat and allow it to cool down. Then take another large vessel and put a large sieve on it. Put a cotton cloth on the sieve. Now strain the liquid in the large saucepan. 6. The strained remains on the sieve can be dehydrated and used as peanut flour and the liquid we get on straining is our peanut milk. 7. Put the peanut milk on stove and bring it to a boil. Turn off the heat. Now put either the juice of 1 lemon or 1 tablespoon of vinegar in this boiling milk. This will curdle the milk . If it does not then use another tablespoon of it. 8. Now we can strain this mixture and separate the solids. Wash the solids in water at least once to remove the sour taste of the acid which we used to curdle the milk. 9. After washing it tie the remains in the cotton cloth and put some weight on it for 2 hours.This will allow the pieces of cottage cheese to stick to one another and get into a solid shape. Or use a paneer maker to do this instead of the cotton cloth. After 2 hours remove the cottage cheese from the cloth or the panner maker.

Voila the paneer is ready. You can either use this immediately in your recipe or you can put it in your fridge in some water for later use.

Fresh homemade cottage cheese