The Smoothie That Made Me Love Cottage Cheese

Healthy cooking doesn’t have to be complicated. In fact, often the simpler it is, the better it tastes. In Good for You, Test Kitchen editor Rebecca Firkser shares nourishing, craveable recipes that you can pull off in 10 ingredients or less.

I recently had to visit not one, not two, but three different supermarkets to find a single container of cottage cheese. At each one I was met with empty shelves. If that isn’t a sign an ingredient is trending!

Cottage cheese’s current popularity is, in large part, tied to our culture’s obsession with protein. I can’t seem to pass a day without seeing a cottage-cheese-based “high-protein” dip, baked pasta, even cookie dough.

We’ve seen cottage cheese in the zeitgeist before, just packaged differently. Low-fat versions were crucial to “diet plates” of the 1950s and subsequent decades, where it was scooped into an underripe cantaloupe half or perched atop a lettuce leaf adorned with pale slices of tomato or canned orange segments, sometimes a bunless burger patty. Go back further still, to the first two world wars, and you’ll find cottage cheese touted by the US government as an affordable protein alternative in an effort to reserve meat for troops.

On this side of the millennium, after a brief overshadowing by Greek yogurt in the early aughts, cottage cheese is firmly back on the minds of those considering their nutrition. But there’s one big difference to years prior: It’s being blended. Stir cottage cheese in its original form into beaten eggs or pasta sauce and it will be a lumpy, watery mess. Once puréed, however, it metamorphosizes—milky in flavor, rich in texture, and densely packed with protein and fat to boot.

From ice cream to queso to two-ingredient “flatbread,” blended cottage cheese has certainly made its mark when it comes to viral recipes. In truth, I never felt compelled to try any of these. (I’d rather have actual ice cream!) But they must have left a mark because last summer, on a particularly hot day, I had the idea to turn cottage cheese into…a smoothie.

Stay with me. I was out of yogurt, and needed something thick and creamy in the mix. Once puréed, the cheese’s clotted texture was gone, leaving only its richness. They say necessity is the mother of invention, and I can think of no better example.

We’ve all had an unpleasantly watery smoothie. Even Heated Rivalry’s Scott Hunter had to sip on a smoothie more akin to juice after his morning run. How to solve such a travesty? Greek yogurt, avocado, and frozen banana are options for improved viscosity, but in my opinion, each offers a compromise in flavor (too tangy, too buttery, too banana-y).

On the other side of the coin, high-end Los Angeles supermarket Erewhon has become famous for its $20-plus layered smoothies so thick with frozen fruit, coconut cream, and other “superfood” powders they practically need to be eaten with a spoon. The store has even gone so far as to partner with a health-testing platform (and functional medicine influencer Mark Hyman, MD) to produce the “World’s Healthiest Smoothie?,” a whopping 20-ingredient concoction.

Whole-milk cottage cheese offers a delightful middle ground for a smoothie that’s flavorful and full-bodied, but doesn’t mandate a laundry list of expensive ingredients. When paired with sweet-tart berries and nutty almond butter (any nut butter works), its mild flavor provides seasoning (all smoothies need a little salt!) and its texture thickens things up. And of course, the fat and protein content make for an actually filling smoothie, important for those long hours between meals.

Now, what to do with the rest of that highly coveted container? Here’s a collection of cottage cheese recipes to choose from. I have my eye on the onion dip, potato chips not optional.