Thursday 24 March 2016

How To Grate Mozzarella Cheese For Perfect Pizza Topping

Disclaimer:  I haven't been paid to promote any products or stores, just sharing a little kitchen hack I've been using for a lot of years to avoid getting my hands icky when making our much loved homemade pizza :)

Hi Honeys
It's almost time to change our clocks here in the UK to roll over from our dark, dismal winter to a bright (please Mother Nature, I'm begging here!) cheery Spring and I am ridiculously excited!  It's been chucking down with rain for the past two days, the skies are dark and grey and the wind is so chilly it could slice & dice a person at our back door!

The clocks go forward one hour this weekend and surely then we'll see some sunshine and (oh my!) actually feel some warmth!  I'm not kidding here honeys, I've so had it with winter, feeling cold, grey, rainy skies and cardigans! I wanna wear t shirts & peg out laundry in lovely sunshine :)

Enough of my moans though :) After the recent surrealness surrounding my OXO post, I thought I'd share another of my "anything to avoid getting my hands icky" habits :)

How to grate mozzarella cheese for perfect pizza, cheese sauce or any other yummy recipe.

Seriously, I cannot stress enough how much I dislike even the idea of my hands getting icky! Can't do it.  Nope. Not even a wee bit.... I know, I'm odd but I like to think I'm odd in a nice way :)

Thing is, I adore mozzarella cheese. It's my second favourite cheese (after perfect Scottish cheddar of course) but it's also packaged in a small bag floating in fluid which means you open the package and it's already in a ready-to-make-your-hands-icky state!

Mozzarella is also the only cheese (sorry Cheddar) to top homemade pizza and I (if I say so myself) make a pretty mean pizza, using homemade dough, fresh basil, tomatoes and lashings of... grated mozzarella :)

How then to get that icky (but delicious) cheese grated and onto my pizza?

It's so easy honeys! I open the mozzarella packaging, drain the fluid away and place the mozzarella ball into a container or a sandwich bag....  

How To Grate Mozzarella Cheese For Perfect Pizza Topping - Mozzarella Cheese drained and placed into a sandwich bag

The bag is then placed into the freezer.  After around half an hour to forty minutes your cheese can be removed from the freezer and should be solid enough to be grated as easily as you would grate cheddar or any other medium cheese.

How To Grate Mozzarella Cheese For Perfect Pizza Topping - Mozzarella Cheese Ready To Grate

Grate, grate, grate and you'll have...

How To Grate Mozzarella Cheese For Perfect Pizza Topping - Perfectly Grated Mozzarella Cheese

The perfect, lighter than air, grated mozzarella cheese to sprinkle over your lovely fresh homemade pizza, to add to your sauce for delicious macaroni cheese (did that tonight! yum!) to sprinkle over cheesy scrambled egg on toast or for any other yummy recipe that might require this mouth-watering cheese  :)

I like to always have a couple of mozzarella cheese balls in the freezer ready to use when needed...

How To Grate Mozzarella Cheese For Perfect Pizza Topping - I like to keep some on hand in the freezer.

I drain and bag the cheese exactly as I did above and then the bagged cheese is placed into a clip seal bag.

Mozzarella cheese freezes perfectly and if you want it to revert back into it's soft, pre-frozen state just remove it from the freezer and allow it to defrost overnight in the fridge to use next day.  It defrosts as perfectly as it freezes.

It's that easy honeys :)  Do you dislike getting icky hands as much as I do?  Do you have any kitchen hacks to avoid icky hands?  If so, please share?  Are you a fan of homemade pizza? I've never tasted a shop bought pizza that compares to homemade, plus none of those dreadful preservatives and E numbers, so homemade is far healthier.

Till next time dear ones, stay warm, smile lots and hug even more, huggles always xxx

Hugs always, Rosie xx

2 comments:

  1. But does the taste or texture change after freezing.
    Like fresh fish which is then froze, it is edible, but quite different.

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    Replies
    1. Hello Jerry, thank you so much for visiting. It's been my experience that the taste doesn't change at all, it's perfectly yummy! The texture can be a little crumblier at times but when grated, it's so, so light, making it perfect as a topping or for adding to sauces or for anything really.

      In the past, I've bought grated mozzarella from the supermarket (though never since I found out how to freeze it) and it tends to be expensive for the amount that's in the bag and it's never as light and "fluffy" as when I've frozen and grated the cheese myself.

      I love that I can buy my mozzarella weeks ahead and always have it on hand in our freezer, ready for a last minute home made pizza (always better than shop bought) for movie night :)

      Thank you so much for visiting Jerry, have a wonderful new week ahead, hugs x

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