In the ten plus years of talking about cheese at this website, Spaulding Gray and I have had one steadfast rule: Praise Cheese in all its glory and stay away from criticizing or denigrating this amazing, healthy food. I can only recall two, maybe three, posts that were less than positive about cheese and one of those was more “tongue-in-cheese” review than a serious negative critique of that particular style of cheese.
But… and as has been said on many times in my lifetime… whenever you use the word “But”, you negate every word that came before… so be it…
Last week I bought a bucket of Daisy Low Fat Small Curd Cottage Cheese at Costco. The Man and I prefer large curd but that choice was not offered. Costco keeps their costs low by offering fewer choices in each category; often only one choice; you can bet it will be the “best” quality in that category. Rarely do I disagree with Costco choices…
The Man and I love cottage cheese; our favorite pairing is with pineapple and cracked black pepper. Let’s face it, cottage cheese is usually not eaten because of its outstanding flavor profile. Even the best of the best small-batch has little taste beyond reminding the taster of high quality, fresh milk.
You eat cottage cheese because it’s good for you; packed with protein and calcium. But (there’s that word again), generally, you pair cottage cheese with food that adds a flavor punch to make it more palatable. I have never had the opportunity to taste Cowgirl Creamery Cottage Cream; it gets kudos from those who have, including James Beard Winning Writer, Janet Fletcher.
Back to Daisy Cottage Cheese. I had never tasted it before. Sadly, in my neck of the woods, I have no access to small-batch CC. It may be time to take Janet’s advice and make my own…
On the positive side, Daisy Cottage Cheese is clean; the ingredients are simple: Cultured Skim Milk, Cream and Salt (the low-fat also includes Vitamin A palmitate) – . That’s it. I have no argument with the ingredients. You can’t get any “cleaner” .
Interesting observation: On the Daisy Brand website, the heavy weight is given to their sour cream with only one picture featuring the cottage cheese and on Twitter their profile name is DaisySourCream with no reference to their cottage cheese – gotta make me wonder why???
My gripe is the size and shape of the curd. The “small” curd is less than small; it’s tiny. Even worse, it’s obviously machine cut into perfectly squared pieces. Yuck; and yuck is a polite word for my reaction. Those curds brought to mind everything I find wrong with “industrialized” cheese: perfectly formed with no personality; nothing to make it special. Natural ingredients but no 
personality. (All hat; no cowboy.)
Last night I posted a picture of a scoop of Daisy CC on my Facebook profile with my dismay at the curd size and shape. I didn’t mention Daisy in the original posting. One of my Foodie Friends, Bob Wedemeyer, of That’s What Bob is Cooking replied “I don’t buy Daisy for just that reason. I LOVE their sour cream, but was HUGELY disappointed in the cottage cheese.” He immediately knew it was Daisy from experience and the photo. He suggested I blend it and use it to make lasagna… guess what The Man and I are having for lunch today…
Okay… I’m done…
1/16/2019… well… maybe not… I took Bob’s advice and blended the cottage cheese and made a “lasagna” (I had no lasagna noodles and used whole wheat spaghetti instead. In addition to the cottage cheese, I used Cabot Cheddar and Monterey Jacks and topped with Parmigiano Reggiano. I combined the CC blend with half of the Cheddar and MJ and two eggs to make the filling. The Man swooned. It may become my “go to” lasagna recipe going forward. I’ll post the recipe tomorrow. But here’s a picture of the finished dish before serving.
In addition to being an American Cheese Society Certified Cheese Professional, I am a Certified ServSafe Food Production Manager with certifications that also include ServSafe Certified Instructor and Proctor. I am available for cheese events, cheese program development, cheese training, food safety training and 3rd party food safety auditing. See my About Me and Resume pages for more details or call me at 360 921 9908 to discuss availability.
Save the date and make your reservations now: Valentine’s Evening, February 14th, at Blue Haven Bee and Southern Origin Meadery Wine Bar: Five luscious hors d’oeuvre, fresh field green salad with French feta, Chocolate and bubbly. $40 per person. Call 706 245 6586 to reserve your table now to celebrate this day with your favorite Valentine.
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