Soft goat cheese as pizza topping without mess

Question

I use soft unripened goat cheese as a pizza topping. I prefer it over crumbled goat cheese for these reasons:

• Soft goat cheese browns easier, melts easier, and has stronger flavour/tang compared to crumbled goat cheese.
• Soft goat cheese is cheaper than crumbled goat cheese.

But of course, soft goat cheese is quite messy to deal with. I end up slicing sections with a knife from the brick of cheese, awkwardly pulling the sections into pieces, and placing them on the pizza — if I can get the cheese to unstick from my fingers. My hands get covered in sticky cheese in the process, which is messy and wasteful.

Is there something I can do that's less messy? For example, is there a way to extrude the soft goat cheese onto a pizza? I'm picturing a device similar to a caulking gun.

Answer 1

A piano wire cutter is great for semi-soft cheese. Get one which is just the wire and the handle, not a "guillotine-style" cutter with a base. Some have a roller integrated to control the thickness; set that to "as thick as possible" and ignore the roller, freehanding the thickness.

The nice thing about the piano wire cutter is that it doesn't stick (much) to the cheese. But it isn't as good as a knife at moving the cut piece away from the rest of the cheese. You can cut a sufficiently soft block of cheese with a piano wire cutter, and afterwards it's still one piece. To get around this, slice directly onto the pizza, holding the cheese block above it and slicing horizontally on the bottom so that the slice falls off as it is cut. Basically you want to never touch the cut pieces, but have them fall into perfect arrangement. (You'll probably have to adjust them the first few hundred times.)

As for the extruding idea: Sure -- you could just stuff some cheese into a pastry bag -- but I suspect you wouldn't be happy with the "ribbons of toothpaste" look of the result. Melty, edge-browned cheese chunks look good on pizza. Stick to that shape.

Answer 2

Perhaps the cheese you're working with is a bit different but with the soft goat cheeses I've used it should be possible to:

• cut the front of the packaging
• gently press the cheese log from the back so a portion protrudes, then cut it (scissors make this easier)
• the cut piece will stick to the scissors or knife, place it on the pizza (can use a toothpick or second knife/fork)

##########################
### cccccccccccccccccccccccccc
   #######################
   ^ press here   cut here ^

If the cheese is too soft, you can probably even use your fingers to detach a portion by pinching the front - or just spoon it over.

Slices won't be perfect especially for the last two methods but after it melts it shouldn't be noticeable.

Answer 3

Just for completeness, I'll post a kind of negative answer here. My point is that I would advise against extrusion.

The kitchen equivalent of a caulking gun is a syringe-like device that's intended as a reusable replacement for pastry bags. The more widespread version is made from not-so-stable plastic and is intended for cake decoration. It works with soft substances like buttercream, and if you pack it full of goat cheese, I expect it to either not expel anything, or break. The sturdier version, which is used to press a log of cookie dough with shaped edges, may be able to extrude goat cheese - or maybe not, since the ones which can be fit with a small diameter nozzle are more likely to be intended as double-duty, and it's possible that it only has enough force to push soft creams through a small nozzle. In any case, these devices are very messy. If you can get them to work, the pizza itself will look pretty, but filling, using and taking apart the device creates quite the mess.

A similar argument can be made against the second type of extruder in the kitchen, the meat grinder. It will produce strands of cheese, but they will most likely stick together immediately. And even if you manage to get a standard-sized meat grinder to work with a single log of goat cheese, half of your cheese will end up as waste, and taking apart and cleaning the grinder could take longer than baking and eating the pizza.

At this softness, you might just about get away with the third option for extrusion - a spätzle press. If you get the cast aluminum cylinder type that gelaterias also use for spaghetti ice cream, and process small pieces at a time, you will end up with strands similar to the spaghetti ice cream. Again, you won't be able to separate the mass well when it falls onto the pizza, and the cleaning involves some time with a brush and a toothpick.

So, for all possible extrusion devices, you can expect that in all factors - cheese piece "niceness", cheese waste, and time spent cleaning - they are much worse than your current method of using a knife.

Answer 4

In addition to any technique for cutting, freezing or partially freezing the cheese will make it less sticky and easier to work with. When frozen, it will be more likely to break apart. If you're looking for nice looking slices, you can get a bowl of hot water and dip your knife in that.

Answer 5

Presumably the reason you care about your fingers getting covered in cheese is that you're trying to do a bunch of pizzas in a row and don't want to keep washing them. If so, I have solution for you:

Get an extra-small cookie scoop, like a 2 Teaspoon one.

Not only will the scoop keep your hands clean, it'll help you portion the goat cheese evenly across the pizza. Plus they're useful for all kinds of other portioning tasks.

Answer 6

You could try using unflavored floss to cut off slices of cheese and section the slices into the size you want. If you do this on a cutting board, then you can scrape the pieces off the cutting board onto the pizza.

Answer 7

Use a wire cubing tool with cheese wire, in a wood frame, on your cheese when nearly frozen. Maybe toss with whey protein powder to prevent stickiness, or lay the cubes out to dry.