What is Quark and How to Make It

What is Quark and How to Make It - The Cheese Shark

Quark is a fresh, soft, unripened cheese with the consistency of a thick yogurt. Quark is very popular in central Europe, especially Germany, and is widely used in cooking. Quark comes in different varieties.

  • No-Fat quark
  • High-Fat quark
  • Creamed quark
  • Fruit quark
What is Quark and How it is Made - The Cheese Shark

Quark contains very little to no salt. It is fermented and acidified with a lactic acid cheese culture and a small amount of rennet. It is made with skim milk and cream is often added, in various amounts, later on.
Traditionally, quark is drained in cheesecloth. Industrial operations use quark separators which use centrifugal force to separate the quark from the whey. Quark is most often made today with ultra filtration, a process in which the quark is filtered away from the whey.

How to Make Quark at Home

1. Non-fat quark and half-fat quark

Ingredients:

  • 2 L/ 2 qt of skim milk or homogenized milk.
  • ¼ tsp of cheese starter culture, you can order this here.
  • Alternatively, you can use 2 tbsp of buttermilk from the store. Make sure that it
    is fresh and not about to expire.
  • A rice kernel size of a rennet tablet, or one drop of liquid rennet mixed in an ⅛ cup of cold water. You can order rennet here.

Tools:

  • Pot
  • Cheesecloth
  • Pasta strainer
  •  

Process:

  • Warm your milk to 25 C/ 77 F in a pot on the kitchen stove.
  • Stir in the culture.
  • Stir in the rennet. 
  • Cover the pot and leave in a warm place (at least at room temperature).
  • If you don’t have a pH meter, let it rest for 20 hours, once the milk has coagulated and tastes sour (comparable to yogurt), proceed to the next step. If you have a pH meter, proceed to the next step when the pH is 4.5 or lower. 
What is Quark and How it is Made - The Cheese Shark

Coagulating milk

What is Quark and How it is Made - The Cheese Shark

Pouring the coagulated milk into the cheesecloth.

  • Line the pasta strainer with cheesecloth.
  • Pour the coagulated curd into the cheese cloth and let it drain until it develops the consistency of yogurt or custard. 
  • Your quark is now ready to use. Place in a tupperware container and keep refrigerated until needed.
What is Quark and How it is Made - The Cheese Shark

2. Creamed Quark

Add about 10% of whipping cream to the non-fat or half-fat quark you made. If you made quark from 2 L/ 2 qt of skim milk you can expect to get about 2 cups of quark. You would then add about 3 tbsp of whipping cream. Of course you can play with it and find the perfect recipe for you.

How and Where to use Quark

Mix and enjoy quark with:

  • Fruit
  • Honey
  • Maple syrup
  • Jam
  • Fresh herbs
  • Salt and pepper
  • Hot sauce
  • Green onion
  • Garlic
What is Quark and How it is Made - The Cheese Shark

Enjoy quark along with:

  • Cereal
  • Pizza
  • Bread or crackers as a spread
  • Pancakes
  • Crepes
  • Baked potatoes
What is Quark and How it is Made - The Cheese Shark

Try out your homemade quark with this delicious Raspberry Quark Cake recipe.

Check out our post on How to Make Cheese at Home to learn the art of making cheese. It’s a fun project for everyone.
For easy homemade cheese recipes check out our Cheese Making Recipes page.

If you are interested in the world of cheese making, visit our cheese Resource page and our How Cheese is Made post. 

We review and suggest Cheese Making Kits here if you would like to get started with making cheese.

Enjoy!!!

Leave us a comment below about how your recipe turned out. Feel free to suggest ideas or what you would like to see in our recipes.

Enjoy!!!

8 thoughts on “What is Quark and How to Make it”

  1. O sweet heavens. I’m gonna have to make me some. I’m a huge cheese head lol. But the fact you can use it in so many different ways is amazing. Great article.

  2. Wow, that is a pretty weird dish you have there, I have never heard of anything like it before. I can see the challenge that it would be to make it and to taste the outcome and the range of things to mix it with. Very well written hope to hear more of your recipes.

  3. Thanks for the recipe!
    I always liked to eat potatoes with quark! Will try it out with your recipe
    Take care

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