How to season home-made cheese?

Question

I have made my first ever cheese (a very basic recipe: heat the milk to 95C, add citric acid, drain the whey, press together - see below), now I need to season it.

I definitely need to add some salt. For this, I can add some salt to whey and soak my cheese in it - this is simple enough. But I wonder if it would be a good idea to combine salting cheese with marinating it like it's done with feta (the usual marinade is olive oil with rosemary, lemon rind, and chilies).

Woult it be a good idea to add salt to the marinade I have described above and to marinate and salt the cheese in one go?

Source of the recipe: https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=https://finecooking.ru/recipe/adygejskij-syr-v-domashnih-usloviyah

Answer 1

Brine first, marinate in oil after.

Brining will firm up and you can decide when salty enough.

EVOO with added herbs/chillies can better be used in recipes without tasting overly salty.

Answer 2

That recipe is very similar to Indian paneer. The downside of salting the whey is that most of the salt gets poured away, so you have to use lots (or soak in a small amount of whey.

When making paneer, one good approach is to salt the curds after draining (though before pressing out the last of the whey). These acid-set cheeses tend to not keep very well, and become too soft for many purposes if kept in the whey, so they're normally stored dry in the fridge, and for only a few days.