Cottage industry

I had always imagined cottage cheese to be a good source of calcium, as is skim milk, but when I checked this on CRON-o-meter I found this wasn’t the case, so I did some checking. Apparently hard cheeses such as cheddar which are coagulated with an enzyme retain the calcium in the curd, whereas cottage cheese which is coagulated by a different process does so to a lesser extent. Also, as Sara rightly pointed out it is high in salt. So 120 calories worth of cottage cheese, or 167g (10% of my daily calories) provides only 8% of my RDA of calcium and a massive 52% of my sodium whereas the same calorie value of cheddar gives me 18% of my calcium and only 14% sodium plus 12% zinc. Of course most of the cottage cheese calories are protein, (20g per 120 cals) whereas the cheddar is mainly saturated fat and the cottage cheese is a better source of some B vitamins, but all the same it wouldn’t do to rely on it for calcium. I have experimented with the idea of fortifying the cottage cheese. 10g skim milk powder, (this can be whizzed in a food mill to make it finer) can be stirred into a 250g carton of cottage cheese making what I call ‘fortified cottage cheese’. 120 calories worth of this – 145g – gives 13% of my daily calcium, but still 44% sodium. The powder thickens the cottage cheese – no very bad thing, and of course the end product tastes milkier which may not suit everyone. But I am thinking of abandoning the whole cottage cheese thing for a better prospect – drained yogurt.

I make my own fortified low fat yogurt with a product called Easiyo, which is amazingly easy to do. I use their probiotic low fat mix (it’s 98% skim milk solids, plus lecithin and cultures) and add 25g skim milk powder to bump up the protein and calcium. I prefer a thick yogurt so instead of making it up to 1 litre with water I make it up to 900ml, but that’s just my personal taste. I have inputted the recipe into CRON-o-meter, using the detailed vitamin and mineral values for skim milk since the pack only gives basic nutritional data. 120 calories worth of this yogurt gives a fantastic 36% of my calcium RDA, 12% of my zinc, 85% of my B12, 12g protein, and hardly any sodium. If I drain some of it in a sieve for a few hours I get a soft spreadable cheese. I also incorporate the yogurt into frozen desserts. This is still possible without an ice cream maker – just whiz up the yogurt with some frozen berry fruits such as raspberries and serve at once. Mmm – mmm!