Salad
Urnebes salad
A fierce cheese and chilli paste from southern Serbia, now standard beside grilled meat across Macedonia.
Recipe from Туѓино Јабано
- Prep
- 45 min
- Cook
- —
- Total
- 45 min
- Fasting
- Not suitable
Ingredients 8 ingredients
Method
- Lift the cheese out of its brine and let it drain in a sieve for ten minutes. Wet cheese makes a slack urnebes that will not hold on a spoon.
- Mash the cheese with a fork until it breaks down to a fine, even crumb. Do it by hand; a food processor turns it to glue in about four seconds.
- Crush the garlic to a paste with the flat of a knife, or grate it on the fine side of a box grater.
- Work the garlic, hot pepper and sweet paprika through the cheese. Start with half the hot pepper — dried Balkan peppers vary enormously in strength, and you cannot take the heat back out.
- Beat in the kiselo mleko, then the oil a spoonful at a time, until the mixture is thick, spreadable and holds a ridge when you draw the fork through it.
- Grind in black pepper, taste and correct. Brined cheese usually needs no salt at all.
- Cover and refrigerate for at least half an hour. Freshly mixed it tastes flat and disjointed; it comes together once the garlic and pepper have had time in the cheese.
- Serve scattered with parsley, alongside grilled meat, or spread thickly on warm lepinja.
If you cannot find it
Substitutions that work outside Macedonia.
- Sirenje
- Greek feta from a block, drained well and mashed; choose a fatty one
- Bukovo pepper flakes
- Aleppo pepper, or mild chilli flakes with an extra teaspoon of sweet paprika
- Kiselo mleko
- Thick Greek yoghurt, or crème fraîche for a richer version
