First and foremost, neither is better or worse. It all comes down to personal preference. But keep reading for our take on Ricotta vs Cottage Cheese Lasagna—our take might surprise you.
Table of Contents
What is Ricotta Cheese?
What is Cottage Cheese?
Comparing Nutrition
The Best Cheese For Lasagna
What Curd Size is Best?
Whole Milk or Low Fat?
Substituting Cottage Cheese
More Cheesy Recipes to Try
What is Ricotta Cheese?
Ricotta cheese is a fresh cheese known as “whey cheese.” It’s made from the resulting whey protein left over from making other types of cheese. You can read more about theprocess here. But for cooking purposes, know that it’s light, fluffy and milk in flavor. Ricotta is best used in lasagna, as fillings for pasta shells, or as a base for dips.
What is Cottage Cheese?
Cottage cheese is also a fresh cheese. It features small curds of cheese in a creamy, milk-like sauce. It’s made by adding an acid to milk, resulting in curds separating from whey. The curds are then cut, pressed, rinsed and seasoned lightly with salt.
Cottage cheese is great in lasagna, as a filling for ravioli, or blending into sauces and dips. We also like to blend cottage cheese to make creamy, protein-packed salad dressings. Mix them into batters to make Cottage Cheese Pancakes or Cottage Cheese Cake. Spread cottage cheese on a plate and top it with canned smoked salmon, herbs and fresh cucumber slices for a delicious and satisfying lunch.
Pros & Cons of Ricotta
If you want a lasagna that’s rich, creamy and decadent, turn to whole milk ricotta. It delivers on richness and creaminess! Be sure to season the cheese well with salt, crushed red pepper flakes, black pepper and dried herbs. Plain ricotta can be, well, very plain and mild. At the very least season it with kosher salt!
Pros & Cons of Cottage Cheese
For a slightly lighter, less-indulgent lasagna, turn to whole milk cottage cheese. It’s less creamy but has great cheesy flavor. The cheese curds create light pockets of cheesiness without weighing down the lasagna. One thing we love about cottage cheese—it’s already nicely seasoned with salt. We recommend adding some pepper, dried herbs and crushed red pepper.
The drawback with cottage cheese is its lack of thick, creaminess.
As the table shows above, per 1 cup measurement, whole milk ricotta has double the amount of calories, more than double the fat content, and five times as much saturated fat as whole milk cottage cheese.
On the other hand, whole milk cottage cheese has more than three times as much sodium as ricotta cheese does.
Protein and carbohydrates are where ricotta and cottage cheese are similar.
The Best Cheese For Lasagna
The key to creating the absolute best lasagna is to use a combination of ricotta and cottage cheese. Ricotta brings the rich creaminess while cottage cheese lightens things up and seasons the whole dish.
For even more cheese, we recommend also using shredded Mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese (or Pecorino Romano).
No more wondering whether ricotta or cottage cheese lasagna is better. Try it for yourself and make our Cottage Cheese Lasagna recipe which combines the best of both parts of both and uses half ricotta and halfcottage cheese.Our homemade lasagna recipe features traditional Italian cheeses, spicy Italian sausage, no-boil noodles, homemade tomato sauce, and loads of fresh veggies, fresh parsley and dried herbs.
What Curd Size is Best?
When it comes to choosing a curd size for cottage cheese, we like small-curd cottage cheese. But frankly. it doesn’t make much of a difference. If you like and have large curd cottage cheese, use that!
Whole Milk or Low Fat?
We are firm believers that whole milk dairy is the best option, always. Can you use low-fat cottage cheese or low-fat ricotta cheese? Sure. The lasagna won’t be as creamy, will likely have excess moisture pooling in the pan, and it may even have a slight grainy texture to it—but nothing that will keep you from enjoying every bite. If you have to choose low-fat for one of them, opt to use low-fat ricotta and whole milk cottage cheese.
Substituting Cottage Cheese
If you don’t want to use cottage cheese, you can simply use more ricotta cheese. (Some recipes feature béchamel sauce—we find that unnecessary).
More Cheesy Recipes to Try
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About The Author
Lauren Grant is a professional culinary food scientist, food writer, recipe developer, and food photographer. Lauren is a previous magazine editor and test kitchen developer and has had work published in major national publications including Diabetic Living Magazine, Midwest Living Magazine, Cuisine at Home Magazine, EatingWell.com, AmericasTestKitchen.com, and more.
The key to creating the absolute best lasagna is to use a combination of ricotta and cottage cheese. Ricotta brings the rich creaminess while cottage cheese lightens things up and seasons the whole dish. For even more cheese, we recommend also using shredded Mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese (or Pecorino Romano).
Cottage cheese, on the other hand, has a grainy texture and larger curds than ricotta. It is not as thick and creamy as ricotta, making it less suitable for use in lasagna filling. Cottage cheese is made from curdling milk, and its curds are much larger and more visible than those of ricotta.
In Italian cuisine, ricotta cheese is a popular ingredient in many dishes, but when it's not available, Italians may substitute it with other soft cheeses like mascarpone, stracchino, or crescenza.
For extra creamy ricotta, add in an extra egg, a handful of grated parmesan, and a quarter cup of shredded mozzarella. Eggs help prevent the ricotta from drying out and serve to bind the ricotta so it doesn't become runny. One or more eggs are recommended whether you add the other ingredients mentioned here or not.
A béchamel is rich, creamy, and better adheres the layers of pasta together. But some still firmly believe ricotta is the way to go. It's lighter in texture than a béchamel and can offset the richness of the meat sauce and mozzarella.
You will not find ricotta cheese in the authentic Italian recipe. And of course, there are so many variations of this dish that you've likely tried: vegetable lasagna, seafood lasagna, and so on. You can even roll up the noodles. We did just that in this spinach lasagna rolls with white sauce recipe.
The correct way to compose lasagna is: ragù sauce on the base, then: lasagna pasta, besciamella sauce, ragù sauce, grated parmesan cheese for each layer, tipically 4 or 5 layers, no more because it will get difficult to bake and the pasta will not be completely cooked in the middle layers.
To me, ricotta alone is too gritty, and, blending in egg binds the ricotta with creaminess. Easy to try. Next time you are making lasagna, use two smaller pans to equal your typical one pan. Then, make one pan as usual, and with the second, add an egg to the ricotta.
It adds a wonderful texture and flavour to the lasagna. We have received requests to make our lasagna without the egg because it just seems so foreign to some people. That's no problem. We don't mind omitting it; but, if you enjoy authentic food, I would encourage you to give it a chance.
The key to creating the absolute best lasagna is to use a combination of ricotta and cottage cheese. Ricotta brings the rich creaminess while cottage cheese lightens things up and seasons the whole dish. For even more cheese, we recommend also using shredded Mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese (or Pecorino Romano).
To drain properly, place a cheesecloth-lined, fine-mesh strainer over a bowl. Place ricotta in strainer, cover with plastic wrap, then place a heavy object (like a large plate) on top. Put all components in the refrigerator and let drain for at least 8 hours. Discard liquid and you'll be ready to go.
Cottage cheese: As far as ricotta substitutes go, light and mild cottage cheese is your best bet. In fact, some people prefer to use cottage cheese because it has a similar flavor and fewer calories.
Cream cheese's richer flavor and thicker texture means you won't need quite as much of it. While most recipes suggest layering thick dollops of ricotta throughout your lasagna, you can spread a thin layer of softened cream cheese across the lasagna noodles, and you'll be good to go.
Whole Milk Ricotta is a smooth creamy spreadable cheese that I prefer to use in my lasagna. The fat and the consistency are just right for a nice smooth, creamy, cheesy, obvious custard layer. In the end if you want a restaurant quality, IG worthy lasagna, go with the best ingredients you can get.
Ricotta cheese has a significant amount of Whey Proteins, whereas Cottage Cheese has Casein Protein as the main fraction. Ricotta Cheese is made with food acid/s, and Cottage Cheese is made with Rennet or Rennet type enzymes.
Introduction: My name is Lakeisha Bayer VM, I am a brainy, kind, enchanting, healthy, lovely, clean, witty person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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