Recipe: vegan saag paneer

I am more likely to be struck by lightning than to bring my grocery list into the store. Usually I leave the list on the kitchen counter, although every now and then the sheet of paper makes it to the car, where it hides in the canvas bags that I also forget to carry in. My tendency to shop from memory is the reason why my pantry is stocked with spaghetti sauce, but is bare of noodles. It’s also why I recently had a refrigerator overflowing with six bags of leafy greens, but no plan for using them.

Kale and spinach are chock-full of vitamins A, C and K, and also contain a good amount of calcium and even some protein. Yet greens aren’t as easy to snack on as, say, Cheetos. No one in my house was going to eat raw greens by the handful; I had to actually cook them or else they’d wilt and I’d forget to throw them away.

My solution was saag paneer, a flavorful Indian dish of cooked saag (leafy greens) and paneer, a cheese with a feta-like texture that’s made from water buffalo’s milk. You may have heard of saag’s cousin, palak paneer, which pairs paneer with spinach. Technically, all palak paneer dishes can be called saag paneer, but not all saag paneer can be called palak paneer. (Which, by the way, is a great sentence to throw out there if you want to prematurely end a party conversation and poke around the dessert table by yourself.) I wanted to use up as much kale and spinach as possible, but saag paneer works with any leafy vegetable you’ve overbought, including collard or mustard greens.

I crave cheese constantly, so I got really excited about DIY vegan paneer, which, it turns out, is crazy-easy to cook up since it’s an unaged cheese made by curdling heated milk with an acid. I boiled soy milk, added white vinegar, and in a stroke of pure cooking magic, the “curds” instantly separated from the “whey.” I say magic because the curds appeared even though there wasn’t a drop of dairy to be found. There was also a puff of smoke, but that may have been a curd that accidentally dropped and ignited on the burner.

I drained the curds and bundled them tightly in a cheesecloth, then refrigerated the whole thing overnight to make the curds stick together. It’s true that overnight refrigeration adds exponentially more prep time, but since paneer doesn’t use rennet as the coagulation agent, patience is essential.

If you need to whip up a quick dinner, you can use pressed firm tofu instead of paneer. The tofu will taste a bit blander than the paneer, even if you fry it. And, of course, you won’t experience the immeasurable satisfaction of handcrafting your own vegan cheese.

Saag paneer looks a lot like creamed spinach with little floating croutons, which is why my husband, Carnivore Bob, was confused by the intense flavors of the Indian spices I forgot to tell him about. Coriander, turmeric and garam masala are a lively trio that adds warm, sweet peppery notes, transforming the dish from basic greens to complex-tasting cuisine. Each bite is so interesting that saag paneer can easily serve as an entree for vegans and omnivores alike, all of whom will be impressed by the whopping 24 ounces of leafy greens you managed to use up.

Click here for the full recipe.