Paneer Bhurji Recipe (Spiced Scrambled Cottage Cheese)
Paneer Bhurji is basically a scrambled and spiced paneer preparation made with onions, tomatoes, herbs and spices. This recipe is a Punjabi style of making this popular and delicious North Indian dish, just the way it is made in my home. Paneer also referred to as Indian cottage cheese is an important source of proteins for vegetarians. Indian cuisine has a variety of dishes made with this milk product. There are different ways you can use paneer in cooking, like make Paneer Kofta of it, use it cubed or diced in curries and also crumble it to make a lovely Paneer Bhurji.
About Paneer Bhurji
In Hindi, the word ‘Bhurji’ literally translates to ‘Scrambled.’ So technically, Paneer Bhurji is basically scrambled paneer or cottage cheese cooked with some more ingredients.
In this quick and simple vegetarian recipe, crumbled homemade paneer is cooked with a sautéed mixture of onions, tomatoes, ginger-garlic paste, green chilies and some spices into a savory, tangy and satisfying dish.
You can actually take it as the vegetarian version of the Indian style scrambled eggs which is popularly known as egg bhurji or anda bhurji in Hindi language.
There are two ways of making this dish. One is the dry or semi-dry version which I have shared here and is the most common way this recipe is made.
The second version called Paneer Bhurji Gravy, has a curry or gravy base and is served in some local eateries (dhabas) and restaurants in North India.
The ingredients and method of preparation of the curried version is unique and different as compared to the dry version.
The flavorful Paneer Bhurji recipe, as like other bhurji recipes, is quick to make and an ideal breakfast dish too.
What’s best is that you can even make a vegan version of the Paneer Bhurji by substituting the Indian cottage cheese (paneer) with tofu.
However, make sure to not use silken tofu or soft tofu for the same. To make it easier for you, refer to this recipe of Tofu Bhurji.
In addition to the Paneer Bhurji recipe, the anda or egg bhurji is also a classic dish served in most of the dhabas or road side eateries in the whole of North and Western India.
While in Punjabi households, even the Mooli Bhurji is quite common, which is made with grated of finely chopped tender white radish of the winter season.
Ingredient Essentials
Here’s a list of all that you essentially need for a tasty, delicious Paneer Bhurji recipe:
- Firm paneer (cottage cheese): It is a no brainer that you would obviously require paneer for this bhurji recipe, as it is the main ingredient here. Paneer is fresh cheese which is made by curdling the milk with an acidic ingredient like lemon juice or vinegar. Whenever I make any dish that uses paneer, I prefer to use homemade rather than store-bought paneer, as it is tastier and fresher.
- Homemade paneer: Making paneer from scratch may sound intimidating at first, but once you try it, it is quite easy and tastes so good. Simply follow the step-by-step instructions on How To Make Paneer and you will have a fresh block of homemade paneer within half an hour.
- Onions and tomatoes: Both onions and tomatoes are unanimously added in many Indian dishes. For the onions, you can use red onions, yellow onions or white onions. For tomatoes, use the ones which are ripe, red and not too tart or sour.
- Ginger-garlic paste: A paste of ginger and garlic is also used in this recipe. To make this paste you simply use a mortar and pestle to crush together the fresh ginger and garlic. Although a freshly made paste is always better, a readymade ginger-garlic paste also can be used.
- Spices: These are the usual Indian ground spices like red chilli powder, turmeric powder, coriander powder and garam masala powder. Most of these are easily available outside India too, in Asian grocery stores and even online. For the garam masala, I always use the homemade one in all my recipes. To make a fragrant and flavorful garam masala powder at home, refer to this recipe of homemade Garam Masala.
How to make Paneer Bhurji
Prep Paneer & Make Onion Tomato Masala
1. Crumble 200 to 250 grams paneer with your fingers and keep aside. I have used homemade paneer.
2. Heat 3 tablespoons oil in a frying pan or kadai (wok) or a sauté pan or frying pan. You can even use ghee or butter, instead of oil.
Add ½ teaspoon cumin seeds and let them crackle on low to medium-low heat.
3. Then, add ½ cup finely chopped onions.
4. Sauté the onions on medium-low heat till translucent and soft.
5. Next, add 1 teaspoon ginger-garlic paste and 1 or 2 chopped green chilies (about ½ to 1 teaspoon, chopped).
6. Mix very well and sauté for some seconds till the raw aroma of ginger-garlic goes away.
7. Add 1 cup tightly packed finely chopped tomatoes.
8. Mix the tomatoes and begin to sauté on medium-low heat.
9. Sauté the tomatoes till completely soft. You can also add a pinch of salt, so that the tomatoes cook faster.
You will see oil releasing from the sides of the mixture, once the tomatoes are softened.
10. Now add all the ground spice powders:
- ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder (ground turmeric)
- ½ teaspoon red chilli powder (or ¼ to ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper)
- ½ teaspoon coriander powder (ground coriander)
- ¼ to ½ teaspoon garam masala powder
11. Mix very well and sauté for 5 to 6 seconds on low to medium-low heat.
Make Paneer Bhurji
12. Add the crumbled paneer and salt as per taste.
13. Mix thoroughly and cook for 1 minute. Don’t cook the paneer for a long time, as it hardens and looses its softness.
14. Turn off the heat and add 3 tablespoons chopped coriander leaves. Mix very well.
14. Serve Paneer Bhurji hot with roti, chapati, phulka, paratha, Pav (dinner rolls) or bread, with a side of thinly sliced onions and lemon wedges.
Squeeze lemon juice on the bhurji before eating. You can also serve it with toasted bread.
Serving Suggestions
Prepare the scrambled paneer and relish it hot with any Indian flatbreads like roti, chapati, phulka or paratha. You can even serve it with pav (dinner rolls) or bread.
When serving the bhurji with Indian flatbreads, make sure to accompany it with a side of thinly sliced onions and lemon wedges.
Squeeze some lemon juice on the bhurji, before eating. This bhurji tastes fabulous with any other North Indian mains as well.
Sometimes, I also toast bread slices and top them with this lovely bhurji. You can even make sandwiches with this bhurji.
Expert Tips
- Paneer or Indian cottage cheese: For best results, used homemade paneer. For packaged or frozen paneer, follow the instructions mentioned on the pack before using. Also, make sure to not cook the paneer for a long time, as it will harden and become chewy in texture.
- Fat: For the fat, you can use oil, butter or ghee. Remember that the kind of fat used modifies the flavors of this dish.
- Tomatoes: The tangy taste in this bhurji recipe comes from the tomatoes. Thus, try to use tomatoes which are ripe, red and with a sweet-tangy taste. Avoid adding tomatoes which are too tart or sour or are unripe.
- Spices: You can decrease or increase the amount of green chillies, red chili powder or cayenne pepper, as per your preferences. Do not add more garam masala powder than what is mentioned in the recipe. If the garam masala is very intense and strongly fragrant, then just add ¼ teaspoon of it.
- Herbs: Always use fresh coriander leaves (cilantro) for this recipe. You can use fresh mint leaves too. Just add 1 to 2 tablespoons of chopped mint leaves, if using it.
- Vegan option: Use firm tofu, in place of paneer. Do not use silken or soft tofu.
FAQs
Is Paneer Bhurji and scrambled paneer same?
Yes. The Hindi word ‘bhurji’ literally translates to ‘scrambled.’ So, any Indian dish with the word bhurji in it essentially means a scrambled form of dish.
Can I make this Paneer Bhurji with freshly made chenna?
Certainly, this bhurji will taste great even if made with freshly prepared homemade Chenna. But remember to drain the liquids or whey really well from the homemade chenna.
How do I make the bhurji more nutritious?
You can make this bhurji more nutritious by adding some vegetables like green peas, capsicum or bell peppers, carrots, etc. and leafy greens like spinach, fresh fenugreek leaves, etc. in the recipe.
Can I make this recipe with silken tofu?
While you can make a vegan version of this dish with firm tofu, I will advice not to use silken or soft tofu for this recipe.
What can I use in place of garam masala powder in this recipe?
If you do not want to use garam masala powder for this recipe, then you can substitute it with pav bhaji masala too.
Step by Step Photo Guide Above
Paneer Bhurji Recipe (Punjabi Style)
Ingredients
- 3 tablespoons oil or ghee, butter or white butter
- ½ teaspoon cumin seeds
- ½ cup onions – (finely chopped) or 1 medium sized
- 3 to 4 small garlic cloves + 1 inch ginger – peeled, made to a paste in mortar-pestle or 1 teaspoon ginger-garlic paste
- 1 or 2 green chillies – finely chopped or slit, or about ½ to 1 teaspoon, chopped
- 1 cup tomatoes (tightly packed, finely chopped) or 2 medium sized to large tomatoes
- ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder (ground turmeric)
- ½ teaspoon Red Chilli Powder or ¼ to ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- ½ teaspoon Coriander Powder (ground coriander)
- ¼ to ½ teaspoon Garam Masala
- 200 to 250 grams Paneer (Indian cottage cheese)
- salt as required
- 3 tablespoons coriander leaves – chopped, (cilantro)
Instructions
Preparation
- Crumble the paneer and set aside. You do not need to make a fine crumble. A coarse crumble with some chunks of paneer is fine.
- Finely chop the onions, tomatoes and green chillies. Keep aside.
- Crush the ginger and garlic to a paste in a mortar pestle and keep aside.
- Also remove the spice powders and keep aside.
Making Paneer Bhurji
- Heat oil or ghee or butter in a pan. Let the oil become hot on a medium-low or medium flame.
- Add cumin seeds. Let them crackle and change color. Once they get browned, add onions.
- Mix well and sauté the onions. When the onions become translucent, add ginger-garlic paste and chopped green chilies.
- Sauté for some seconds till the raw aroma of the ginger-garlic goes away.
- Then add tomatoes and sauté on medium-low heat till they become soft. You can add a pinch of salt so that the tomatoes get cooked faster.
- Now add all the dry spice powders – turmeric, red chili powder, coriander powder and garam masala powder.
- Mix the spice powders very well and sauté for 5 to 6 seconds on low to medium-low heat.
- Then, add the crumbled paneer. Mix throughly and cook for 1 minute on low heat.
- Don’t cook the paneer for a long time as they harden and loose their softness.
- Lastly add the chopped coriander leaves and mix.
- Serve Paneer Bhurji hot with bread toast. You can also serve it with roti, plain paratha or as a stuffing in burrito or wraps.
Video
Notes
- Paneer: For best results used homemade paneer. If using packaged paneer or frozen paneer, then follow the instructions mentioned on the pack before using.
- Tomatoes: The tangy taste in paneer bhurji comes from the tomatoes. So do use tomatoes which are ripe and with a sweet-tangy taste. Avoid adding tomatoes which are too sour.
- Spicing: You can reduce or increase the amount of green chillies, red chilli powder or cayenne pepper as per your preferences. Do not add more garam masala than what is mentioned in the recipe. If the garam masala is very strong, then just add ¼ teaspoon of it.
- Herbs: Always fresh coriander leaves (cilantro) are added in the dish. But you can use fresh mint leaves too. Just add 1 to 2 tablespoons of chopped mint leaves.
- Fat: For the fat you can use oil or butter or ghee. Note that the type of fat used does change the taste of the dish.
- Vegan Option: Use firm tofu in place of paneer. Do not use silken tofu or soft tofu.
Nutrition
Paneer Bhurji recipe from the archives was first published on June 2013.
This recipe of paneer bhurji, is not just a favourite at my home, but is also loved by all my friends as well.
Thats nice to know and thanks so much for this lovely feedback.
Thank you!
Very well explained step by step process & seems very easy.
Thanks for sharing the recipe
Most welcome and glad to know.
Nice and simple ? There are other variations and I like cooking with sautéed gram flour and milk at the end.
always love a paneer dish
perfect for a dinner with friends
this worked for me as a perfect substitute for scrambled eggs in the morning! great idea 🙂
thanks for this recipe!!!
Very good
Great recipe. Infact all the recipes on this site are superb. Grateful to veg recipes of India for my cooking learning. Wish you every success. Thankful to you for sharing your knowledge, expertise and experience cooking. Love goodwill and gratitude always
Geetika Saini
Thanks a lot and so glad to read your comment. Most welcome and thanks again.
Hi Dassana,
Although my comment does not pertain to your current recipe, I wanted to thank you for all the wonderful recipes and beautiful detailed explanation with pics. I tried out your whole wheat bread recipe and it was perfect. I couldn’t leave a comment below that recipe as the comments to that were closed. Thanks once again and keep up the good work. Best wishes.
Thanks a lot Vibha for the feedback on the wheat bread, other recipes and the best wishes too. Most welcome and thanks again.
Thank you for the recipe. I tried it and it turned out wonderful. In the end I added some cream to reduce the spicyness and it tasted great.
Easy to prepare and thanks for the recipe…
welcome and thanks.
Love your recipes, can I please request you to confirm that one teaspoon is equal to 5 ml.
thanks. 1 teaspoon is approx 4.92 ml. so you can round it up to 5 ml.
Thanks u so much for sharing such mouth watering dishes. Your dishes really come out yummy. It adds a new taste to my everyday cooking……
Easy to make and tasty recipe.thanks!!
welcome and thanks leera.
It is best… I tried making paneer bhurji first time and received compliment from my husband..saying it is yummy and tasted just as he wished. Thanks ????… Keep sharing your recipes.
thanks archana for sharing your feedback. glad to read it. welcome and happy cooking.
I tried paneer bhurji. It’s really awesome.
It’s very easy to make & a very gud recipe for beginners like me.
Thank you so much.
thanks vaishnavi for this feedback and rating. glad that the recipe worked good.
I’m a hostelite and staying away from home plus being a beginner at cooking, your recipes are a life saver!!!
Thank you so much for your wonderful work!!!!
welcome prachi and thank you for this lovely feedback. happy cooking.
Your recipes are so simple and the resulting dishes are really tasty. I have followed your page for the past 3 years and all the dishes have been perfect! Please start a mobile app for this page as well!
thank you aarti. we had a mobile app earlier. we had to remove it as everyday we would get technical complaints from readers. also we were not getting goos support from the third party company which we had hired to make the app. so it was becoming too difficult to handle these issues. so we decided to call it quits.
Wow! Simple, easy, yummy & nutritious.
Thanks Uma
i am a beginner at cooking.. i have followed many of your recipes and this one i cooked recently. all of them have turned out to be amazing. you are doing a great job.. thanks a lot! 🙂
Welcome Payel. Glad to know this. Thanks for sharing your positive feedback on recipes.
Can we add capsicum to this recipe of Paneer Bhurji?Will it taste good?Please tell me asap.Thanks!
you can add capsicum. it will taste good.
Really very nice recipe.
I am a beginner and this dish turned out to be very delicious.thankyou.
Welcome Eleena. Nice to know this.
I am new to cooking. Could you please suggest salt quantity.
for most recipes for 3 to 4 servings, you can easily add ½ to 1 teaspoon of salt and this depends on the type of dish, example dry or gravy/curry. start with adding ¼ teaspoon salt and mix well. check the taste and then add ⅓ to ¼ teaspoon more of the salt. stir well and check again. this way you can add salt little by little.
Easy, fast and yummy
Excellent. It came out so yummy. Thank you.
Welcome Seetha
Superb speechless and thanks
Welcome Hardik
Your recipes are just yummy like in restaurant, never disappoints, loved this paneer bhurji too 🙂
thank you falguni for such a nice feedback. happy cooking.
How simple and easy!
Thank you so much dassana:)
welcome shanmuga 🙂 thanks for positive feedbaack.
Nice recipe
thanks priyanka 🙂
Hi dasanna.. can i pack this for lunch box? Or it has to be served hot? Can you please clarify?
renuka you could serve them hot as well as pack for lunch box 🙂 hope this information helps you thanks.
Nice n easily to make.. Paneer bhurji..
Nice recipe. I love cooking for my mom and she enjoy every recipe I prepair from your blog. thanks a lot
welcome and thankyou varsha 🙂
Super recipe! This is the first recipe I came across for paneer burji and the reviews were good so I gave it a shot. I found I had too much paneer for the masala I had made, so ended up making another half batch (minus the paneer) and adding to my original amount. Was perfect. Will be making again and again! Thanks again for posting!
surely try again jenny glad you liked the recipe and thankyou for yoru kind and positive words. also you are welcome.
If tomatoes is not added to recipes thn??
you can skip tomatoes. some tang will be missing from the recipe, but its fine to skip tomatoes.
Thanks n good
could u please post a recipe for paneer tikka biryani
mv have taken your request on our file for the paneer tikka biryani recipe thankyou.
Very easily made…thnx for this recipe…I made it..Following ur step by step process
welcome prerna
I made mind blowind paneer bhurji using this recipe !!!! Thanks !
welcome sandhya
Though you have already added tomatoes for the tanginess, you can also additionally add amchoor/ dry mango powder for extra taste.
thanks radhika for the tip.
Hi Dassana,
Yesterday the cook did not prepare enough sabzi for the entire family. This morning hubby asked me to make paneer bhurji for him and me.
Though I have made this dish previously by looking at other websites, the result was ok. This morning in a hurry, I blindly followed your recipe (I trust you so much) and it came out perfectly!
Thank you so much 🙂
welcome radhika. glad to know this. thanks for your trust.
really loved it… And your clear instructions with photos makes it so easy to do it…
only mistake i did was i over cooked it.. and I didnt add cottage cheese.. May be next time I can do it perfectly .. thanks 🙂
welcome joey
Hi.Today I tried this recepie.superb….I tried some of ur recepies.All were awesome.I am a big fan of ur recepies…tnx a lot …
welcome smitha. glad to know this.
I made this today for lunch with a variation of adding finely chopped palak to it. It became a bit sour 🙁 Maybe too much tomato (I put one large one) or did the palak do that?
Great recipe otherwise. Thanks..
tender palak can taste sometimes a bit sour. or it can be the tomato too. so either one of them must have caused the sourness.
I think the culprit is palak. Slightly in excess, and it tastes sour.
Thanks for the recipe… My kids loved it.
welcome archana
Thanks for the recipe. It was tasty.
welcome bhumika
Thanks for the recipe. It was very tasty
welcome bhumika
easy quick n tasty… recipe… for the young…
The perfect substitute for Egg burji! Loved it… Thank you
welcome megha
Love your recipes so far – easy & delicious!!! Thank u 🙂
welcome sapna
Tmrw is my hubbys bday….he likes it so much…illl prepr fr him..thnksss
welcome disha
wow…………………it’s so easy and tasty ymmmmmmmmmm………..
Sooooo yummy!!!
Awesome dish!!! Serve it as a main, side or breakfast… It works great for me always 🙂