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Cheese from Bhutan

Datshidatshi

Milk is soured into dahi by back-slopping, churned to take off the butter, and the buttermilk is heated until the casein clumps; the curd is squeezed in cloth and rolled into balls. The curd is set by heating the buttermilk, not by rennet. Kept a week at room temperature, datshi turns slimy and pungent and is called zoety.

Fully documentedCheese7.9 days – 10 daysFamily: Acid-heat set cheese family (FERMENTATION BOUNDARY)

Recipe

Datshi, a photo from Wikimedia Commons
Photo: Nair A, Choden D, Pradhan M., CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
No fixed amounts recordedHousehold practice has no fixed amounts. A controlled lab make used 0.1 % starter culture by volume of milk.
Cow milkBoiled, then fermented into dahi[nair2022][shangpliang2017]
Dahi from an earlier batch (back-slopping)Traditional starter; a lab version used 0.1 % yogurt culture instead[shangpliang2017][nair2022]
No saltUnlike many cottage cheeses, no salt is added[nair2022]
Starterback-slopping with the previous dahi

Total time across the recorded steps: 7.9 days – 10 days

Start
Drag the bar or press Play
shapes, not to countLactic acid bacteria35 °CMilk sugarLactic acid

What changes: Boiled milk, seeded with the last batch of dahi, sours into a set curd

Step 1 of 5
Ferment milk into dahi
Time
20 h – 3 days
Reported
Temperature
35 °C
Reported
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Lactic acid bacteria
Yeasts
Moulds

Output: dahi (set fermented milk).

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

lactic bacteria from the previous batch sour the milk

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Milk is soured into dahi by back-slopping, churned to take off the butter, and the buttermilk is heated until the casein clumps; the curd is squeezed in cloth and rolled into balls. The curd is set by heating the buttermilk, not by rennet. Kept a week at room temperature, datshi turns slimy and pungent and is called zoety. Made in 5 steps over 7.9 days – 10 days. The longest step, mature into zoety (optional), takes 7 days (Nair A 2022). Lactococcus lactis subsp. lactis, Enterococcus faecium and E. faecalis does most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step7 daysReported[nair2022]Mature into zoety (optional)
Temperature35 °CReported[nair2022]Ferment milk into dahi
AciditypH 5.2Measured[shangpliang2017]Strain and roll into balls

What makes this one different

Datshi is made from the buttermilk left after butter is churned from dahi. The milk is fermented first, and only the buttermilk is heated to make the curd, so the cheese is partially defatted and has no added salt.

Milk
Buttermilk from cow-milk dahi
Ripening
Eaten fresh, or matured about a week into zoety
Microbial load
Market datshi had 10.5 log cfu/g total aerobes and 8.3 log cfu/g yeasts and moulds; zoety had 11.3 and 9 log cfu/g
Composition
Market datshi 68.7 % moisture; zoety 73.7 % moisture

Related ferments

Variants

  • ZoetyFresh datshi kept a few days to a week at room temperature until slimy and pungent; used in small amounts to flavour curry.

Safety

Market samples carried very high microbial loads (total aerobes 10.5 log cfu/g), much higher than a lab make from boiled milk; the authors tie this to hygiene in handling.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

Datshi is the most common dairy product in Bhutan; the country made 3953 tonnes of it in 2018, all used within Bhutan. A 2024 study quoting the 2022 national census says 2,382 tonnes of Bhutan's milk went into datshi and 1,508 tonnes into butter, and that datshi making has changed little, being milk fermented for a few days at room temperature without pasteurisation.

  1. [nair2022] Nair A., Choden D., Pradhan M. 2022, Chemical composition and microbial quality of Datshi and Zoety, unripen cottage cheese of Bhutan, Food Science and Nutrition 10(5):1385–1390paper
  2. [shangpliang2017] Shangpliang H.N., Sharma S., Rai R., Tamang J.P. 2017, Some technological properties of lactic acid bacteria isolated from dahi and datshi, naturally fermented milk products of Bhutan, Frontiers in Microbiology 8:116paper
  3. [rai2024] Rai A., Dema T., Thinley P., Dorjee J. 2024, Process standardization of traditionally produced cheese (datshi) and its effect on improving sensory attributes, microbial quality and shelf life, Bhutan Journal of Animal Science 8(1):111–119paper