The desire to test cottage cheese for naturalness periodically arises from everyone who is forced to buy this product in a store or on the market. You don’t need to go to the laboratory for this - a test for the presence of additives such as starch and vegetable fat can be done without leaving the counter.
What does cottage cheese consist of and what should it be?
In fact, cottage cheese is a protein concentrate. It also contains a certain percentage of fat (in the store, as a rule, from 0.5 to 9%, in the home - up to 18–20%). Another component is serum. They try to express it as much as possible, but sometimes “wet” home-made cottage cheese is found on sale. In terms of quality, this is neither good nor bad, but when buying, you should remember that you overpay for whey at a price of 300 rubles / kg instead of 30 rubles / liter, and in addition, you get a less nutritious product.
Curd is prepared by fermenting milk. This is done in one of two ways:
- adding ferment with a high content of lactic acid bacteria;
- adding rennet and, in some cases, calcium chloride along with bacterial sourdough.
When a protein clot forms in milk, it is separated, heating the container to low temperatures.Then spread on a special sieve or wrap in a gauze bag so that the remaining serum.
There should be no non-dairy components in natural cottage cheese. Tinting carrot juice, increasing fat content with vegetable oils, increasing the yield due to starch-absorbing serum and other tricks are considered fakes.
In appearance, the curd can be either coarse-grained or fine-grained. It depends on the cooking method. But too homogeneous, almost pasty consistency indicates falsification.
Checking cottage cheese at home
The reagents that are needed for verification can be found in every home. Moreover, you can always take them with you, going to the market or to the farmer's shop.
Starch Test
All you need:
- a small amount of cottage cheese (even a teaspoon is enough);
- iodine solution purchased at a pharmacy;
- glass pipette or cotton swab.
Checking the cottage cheese with iodine is very simple: you need to apply a solution (drip from a pipette or spread with a cotton swab) and observe the chemical reaction.
A natural product in which starch has not been added will turn yellow, orange or brown. The intensity of the shade will depend on the amount of iodine used. If starch is present, the color will almost instantly turn blue or purple.
Starch in cottage cheese does not pose a health hazard, however, such a product becomes less useful and certainly cannot be considered natural.In addition, it contributes to the appearance of extra pounds, because starch is fast carbohydrates and a large number of excess calories.
Vegetable Fat Test
Determining the presence of non-dairy - palm or beef - fat is also simple. For this we need:
- 100-150 ml glass capacity;
- boiling water (it can be brought to the market in a thermos);
- some cottage cheese.
If, after the cottage cheese was placed in a container and filled with boiling water, round drops of fat appeared on the surface of the water, it is highly likely that this fat was added to the product artificially.
Another test method is organoleptic. An unpleasant greasy taste that remains in the mouth indicates that the cottage cheese is falsified.
How to fix a product with additives?
Unfortunately this is not possible. From "starched" cottage cheese, if the absence of other additives is not in doubt, you can cook lazy dumplings or cheesecakes. A product with fats of unknown origin should not be included in your diet.
Is it worth checking the cottage cheese that grandmothers from the village sell?
Age and place of residence are a dubious guarantee of quality. Firstly, you should not buy sour-milk products from your own hands or in natural markets, because in addition to the relatively harmless starch and palm oil, they can contain a lot of pathogenic microflora. She can’t be identified at home. And secondly, even in the official market, sellers sometimes cunning, handing over good quality cottage cheese for analysis, but selling customers a completely different product.Verification does not take so long to neglect it.
How else can you check the curd?
If the composition contains chalk, lemon juice or vinegar will indicate it - after the acid gets on the cottage cheese, hissing will begin and small bubbles will appear.
Checking home or farm cottage cheese with iodine is easy, but remember that such an analysis shows only the presence or absence of starch in the composition. Starch is not the only component that dishonest manufacturers use for falsification. It is also worth making sure that the dairy product does not contain vegetable and animal fats.