Rubing is a semi-soft white cheese made from goat’s milk in Yunnan province, China. It is not aged, drained into cheesecloth, and served deep-fried. Rubing is an acid-based cheese and is often served with Xuanhua ham.
Rubing, which is literally translated from the Chinese phrase milk cake, is a form of semi-soft white cheese made from goat’s milk that has a less pungent odor than traditional goat cheese. It is made in Yunnan province in southwestern China by descendants of the Yi minority, who call themselves the Bai or Sani people. A common method of serving cheese locally is Shuijian Rubing, which involves deep-frying and making savory, spicy, or sugar-based appetizers. It has been compared to the Greek Haloumi cheese, which is also a salty white cheese made from sheep’s milk and commonly grilled or fried before eating.
The Bai people sometimes refer to Rubing cheese as Youdbap, which is a translation of the term goat’s milk. It is a farmer’s cheese that is not aged before being consumed and is made by heating goat’s milk and souring it with a chemical obtained from vines or with vinegar. After the cheese rub is made, which takes less than an hour, it’s drained into cheesecloth for half an hour and can then be refrigerated for up to a week. It’s not a cheese that can be easily melted, so it’s considered more of a supplement to meals than one to add to other dishes.
Recipes as of 2011, however, often include it as a substitute for tofu in dinner parties or as an additive to vegetable dishes containing tomatoes and broccoli. In Kunming, China, the capital of Yunnan province, Rubing cheese is often added to a dish that contains broccoli and tomatoes, as well as garlic, soy sauce and salt for flavoring, which are mixed together and heated in a wok. Yunnan cuisine regards Rubing as fried goat cheese due to the way it is commonly eaten. Other contemporary recipes for it as of 2011 include mixing it with chocolate, rose flavors, and sweetened milk. Restaurants in the region often serve it with a locally produced ham known as Xuanhua ham.
The types of cheeses are generally grouped into one of two categories, being rennet-based or acid-based in nature. Rubing is a form of acid-based cheese, which is a category of soft cheeses, or farmer’s cheeses formed by adding bacterial cultures or souring agents to milk. They are prepared quickly and often have little or no aging process before they are eaten, unlike hard rennet cheeses such as cheddar which increase in flavor as they age. Goat milk cheeses related to the original Yunnan Rubing are produced in many regions, such as Rubing Queijo produced in Arab nations, Rubing Queso from Spain, and Rubing from France.
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