Finding ricotta cheese substitute in Germany

Those of you who cook - do you know of a good Ricotta cheese substitute that can be found here? What about Quark? I did a google search and that was what I saw to be a substitute. What is this quark stuff? I thought it was a matter particle that egg-headed physicists theorized about.

Quark is curds, or the solid part of milk. Its what most cheeses are made from. Ricotta cheese however is made up of whey, or the watery part of milk.

Hmm. Depends what you want to cook. Sometimes quark can be used as a ricotta substitute, but then again, sometimes so can yoghurt.

Why don't you use, ummmm, like, ricotta or something. You can get it in every supermarket here.

I believe Quarks are no longer theoretical...but I could be wrong. So Ricotta is the "curds and whey" of Little Miss Muffet fame? I always thought that was cottage cheese.

Try mascarpone.

In the States, I always had to subsitute ricotta for mascarpone when I wanted to make Tiramisu. In Germany you can fortunately find the latter everywhere. Should work.

Most cheese as far as I know is made up of some combination of curds, whey or both. Ricotta is mostly whey based, cottage cheese mostly curds based. Little miss muffets "curds and whey" is probably just milk either well past its use by date or treated with vinegar to initate the protein reconfiguration causing the 2 to separate.. As far as I know its not such a tasty dish, so one presumes the poet had some hidden meaning behind getting miss muffet to eat it. After all, tuffets are as funny a thing to be sitting on, as curds and whey are to eat.

You can make your own ricotta

http://perso.club-internet.fr/molaire1/e_quark.html

some info there about quarks. The problem it states there that quarks are unable to exist alone, so you'll always have to buy at least one. happy hunting !

http://education.jlab.org/glossary/quark.html

Just for info, Quark, the food, is called quark in English too. I saw it for sale with this name in Canada in a regular grocery store. Whey, from the curds and whey classic tale, is called Molke in German. Very low in fat and calories, good mixed with fruit juice.

aren't the curds still fighting for independence?

what about the shiites?

Okay, guys, back on topic. Sometimes the Tenglemann here in Haar get abounding amounts of Mascarpone and forget the Ricotta. For those tight spots in between when we crave lasagne, I've heard that Quark can substitute. I think Mascarpone is too sweet, cottage cheese (which I see often) is too icky... yep, icky. I think it's the texture for me. Nice to see, though that we can discuss physical particles and recipes in the same thread.

re: ricotta made up of the whey... all I knew was that it was RE-COTTA or in Italian, TWICE COOKED. So, I guess the specialness of the cheese in the processing. I didn't realize that it was a different part of the dairy process. Good to know! I guess, I'll just try to get to the H+L or Tengelmann on Mondays, which seems to be the day for fresh stock. That way I'll be sure to get ricotta.

Still, if anybody has any thoughts about Quark, let me know. Particularly if you've used it in a recipe.

If it's for Lasanga, you can use lots of different cheese. Cream cheese, creme fraiche, mozzarella, but really, you should be using bechamel sauce.

Quarks (the physics kind) are indeed real...and they come in six different flavours...and I'm not making that up

There's up,down, top, bottom, strange and charm quarks.

not sure how they taste on a pizza though.



Edit: Quark is also a Ferengi bar keeper on DS9.

meckle shudders as 3lions essence leaves his body

There's also truth, beauty, centre and sideways quarks now, too. And, of course, don't forget all their antiquark partners.

is there any place in the Vickualienmarkt that sells ricotta ? My smelly flat mate has sent me a request, otherwise our Lasanga will be a bit dry he said. Or better yet can I get the premade type sauce in MiniMal ?

use creme fraiche or mozaralle like showem wrote in 2004.

or why not just use ricotta
which you can buy in any supermarket, as MysteryMan also wrote in 2004

Indeed, and if it is actually for Lasagna, follow showens advice further and make a Bechamel like you actually should.

Thanks for your replies.

I haven't seen ricotta here. I like cheeses and I've never seen it in a shop here. I did a search and people said it was hard to get and I wondered had anyone located it in the last year.

Bechamel :
http://frenchfood.about.com/od/frenchcuisi.../a/bechamel.htm
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
4 Tablespoons flour
2 cups cold mild (what the jesus is this ?)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon white pepper
dash of nutmeg
1 teaspoon sugar

how is this like cheese ? :confused:

Not wanting to seem rude, but I think it's a typo from what I know about béchamel. Try milk instead.

thanks sarabyrd. when it comes to fancy cooking I am useless.

NP, does it have instructions as well?

Why would you need ricotta cheese to keep a lasagna moist was what I meant really. Yeah, you can chuck ricotta into or onto a lasagna, sure, but its not a thing you need to keep a lasagna from going dry. Don't use the fan option on your oven if you have one though - rubbish invention, dries everything out.

don: he (smelly) said that he doesn't have any cheese and without it our lasangna would be more like spaghetti bolognese in a well ordered strata.

I read the thread titles as it was impossible to get Ricotta in Munich, plus I've never bought it here, so when I read it it should have been that they wanted a subsitute instead of fatty ricotta cheese (i think).

EDIT : corrected post

OK, cheese is not needed atall if you have none - its nice to have some on top, it browns easier, but bechamel browns fine on its own anyway.

Bechamel is basically milk thickened with flour and butter, a "roux", one of the basic thickening thangs. The recipe you found had a typo, as somebody said.

Its really easy to make, but also easy to screw up a bit.

For the simplest, most basic bechamel, chuck 3 tbsps butter in a pan, and add 3 tbsps flour. Mix well, but don't let it colour much. Add 500ml WARMED milk (believe me, its much easier) little by little, a ladel at a time or so, and mix it in well each time. At first, a paste will form, but it will get smoother as more milk is added, just trust it. It might end up a bit lumpy, and need to be passed through a sive. At any rate, it will need seasoning.

Sounds like hassle eh? Probably why wour flatmate just wanted to whack a load of cheese in between layers. Thing is though, with cheese alone, all the slices of pasta won't stick together well, and your lasagna will be a bit rubbish to serve up, as it might fall apart a bit. You can probably buy premade bechamel, but its always a bit stodgy, so warm it up, and add a few tbsps water to loosen it up a little more.

I haven't had a problem finding ricotta in most bigger grocery stores- it's usually right next to the mozzarella & marscapone. However cottage cheese could be used as a substitute, I think its called "hüttenkäse" here.

The brand of ricotta that I've bought (in Tengelmann, Hit, etc.) is called "Santa Lucia" and is in a plastic tub surrounded by a cardboard thingy. It's blue. I'd take a picture but I've lost my digital camera temporarily. Seems to be widely available.

Tangent...

Does someone have a good list or wants to think up useful substitutes for common ingredients? Sometimes you can't find something or it's just Sunday and all of the shops are closed...

A Google image search for "Santa Lucia ricotta" yields:

[img]http://www.galbani-service.de/resource/15073110022004.jpg[/img]

The British_and_American_Foods wiki page has a short list, as do good cookbooks. I recommend the Joy of Cooking. Stuff like subsitute for a cup of buttermilk with a cup of milk - 1 tablespoon milk +1 tablespoon vinegar or lemon juice.

Substitutes for common cooking ingredients a thread has been started if you don't like using the wiki for some reason.

The Greeks have something very similar to Ricotta. It is called Manouri.
[img]http://aegeanfoods.alphalink.com.au/manouri.jpg[/img]
You can even find it in most Turkish shops as well, many supermarkets stock it as well. I used to buy the Greek one, because I prefered its consistency to Ricotta and it tastes the same. It is also cheaper.

bechamel sounds like what we call white sauce back home? is it the same thing?

Thanks Saan...this modern world!