A Little Feta Goes a Long Way

Around here, cheese can be rare. And if not rare, expensive – so those of us volunteers/people on very small salaries can rarely buy it. When you do feel like splurging, then, it’s important to really get a lot out of your cheese.

A few weeks ago, I found a block of what was labeled “Buffalo feta” at an imported foods store. According to the label, it was part of the Royal Project, an income-generation and/or opium-substitution program sponsored by Thailand’s Royal Family. Since I’m a pretty big proponent of introducing more dairy to Thailand, for selfish reasons, I decided to support this initiative by buying the cheese.

It turned out to be pretty good, though somewhere between feta and mozzarella. Not quite as strong as the feta I’m used to, but similar, with a hint of fresh mozzarella. And from the name and picture on the label, it appears to be made from water buffalo milk, which is pretty cool.

In the interest of making your cheese go a long way, I have two feta recipes for you.

1) Feta, Watermelon and Mint Salad

Pretty self-explanatory, and a great, refreshing snack for hot season. Just chop up some mint, cut some watermelon slices, and sprinkle some feta on top.

No cooking equipment required.

2) Feta and Roasted Vegetable Pasta

serves 2

equipment: rice cooker (and optional oven)

1 zucchini

2 small purple eggplants (or one big one)

1 package of pasta

water

1/4 cup of crumbled feta or other salty cheese

1 Tbsp dried oregano (optional)

olive oil to taste

salt and pepper to taste

1. Cook the pasta in your rice cooker, using enough water to cover about an inch over the pasta. Keep an eye on it, since the rice cooker will not turn off automatically when the pasta is done, like it does for rice.

2. For this recipe, I did use my oven to roast slices of the zucchini and eggplant in some olive oil. But if you don’t have an oven, you should be able to sauté the vegetables in some oil in your rice cooker. I’ve used this technique for other vegetables. Just turn it on, add some oil, and close the lid and turn it on to heat the oil. Once you can hear the oil sizzling, open the lid and add the chopped zucchini and eggplant. Keep the lid open – the weight of the vegetables will keep the cooker on – and stir occasionally until done.

3. Add the vegetables to the pasta, add the oregano and some salt and pepper, and drizzle some olive oil over it. Add the crumbled cheese and toss to mix. Enjoy.

This also works well cold as leftovers, like a pasta salad.