An Unholy Alliance of Ingredients

I put three things together in a fit of desperation... and it worked!

Growing up, I noticed my dad had a strange knack for putting random odds and ends atop cottage cheese. His formula seemed to be Something From The Back of the Fridge + Unexpected Condiment + Cottage Cheese. It was, and often still is, horrifying. Just recently I watched him gleefully enjoy a bowl of strawberries, sriracha, and cottage cheese.

“You’ve got your sweet, you’ve got your tangy!” he shrugged with a smile, watching me recoil to the farthest corner of our table (which was round, ironically).

I love my dad’s strident willingness to mix ingredients, even if I have no desire to join him on his strange culinary paths.

But then the other night I came to realize that perhaps I am much more like my father than I had ever expected.

The setup is familiar to NBD Fancy readers: late night, growling stomach, no patience for actual cooking. I needed food, and I needed it quickly, but what could I throw together?

My eyes first landed on some garlicky chili oil I had made the day before. This magnificent jar of goodness came courtesy of

Hetty Lui McKinnon

‘s cookbook Tenderheart and has now become the star of my week. The recipe calls for gently poaching garlic in oil for ten minutes before adding diced bird’s eye chilis, Szechuan peppercorns, soy sauce, sugar, and some red chili flakes. The result: a spicy flavor bomb condiment that seems to pair with… everything? Now I see why chili crisp is having a moment. (Notably, chili crisp has become such big business that David Chang, who enjoys cosplaying as a regular, chill dude, is currently sending cease and desists to small businesses in an effort to trademark “chili crunch.”)

So, I would start with the garlicky chili oil. What could I drizzle it on?

My eyes darted around the fridge, scanning ingredients like The Terminator. Suddenly I had a bizarre notion. What if… WHAT IF… I did something truly wild? What if I drizzled my homemade chili crisp over… pickled herring!

I’ve been contemplating interesting ways to play around with pickled herring for months — I sincerely believe it’s overdue for the hipster spotlight (à la tinned fish) — and pairing it with chili crisp seemed like a step in the right direction. The heat and umami punch of the oil should play nicely with pickled herring’s bright acidity, I reasoned.

But I wanted this to be more substantial than just herring with a condiment. It needed body; something unifying. You already know where this is headed: cottage cheese.

The old adage is that fish and dairy don’t go well together, but I actually think it’s kind of BS. Lox and cream cheese is literal heaven; lobster mac ‘n’ cheese is a thing, and who doesn’t love some sort of crab rangoon?

All this is to say that I had no qualms in reaching for my beloved cottage cheese, which, incidentally is also having a trendy resurgence on TikTok. Would the trio of chili crisp, pickled herring, and cottage cheese actually work? Spoiler: yes, otherwise I wouldn’t be writing about it, but let’s pretend like you’re still in suspense.

First I spread a bed of cottage cheese. This was maybe three heaping spoonfuls, perhaps four, that I piled onto the center of a plate and then pressed softly down upon to create a flat mound.

Next I scooped whatever pickled herring I had left in my jar onto the cottage cheese. If I caught some stray onions in the tines of my fork, so be it. The quantity is vague, but I wanted to use enough to cover about two thirds of the cottage cheese.

Lastly, I drizzled the garlicky chili oil over the whole thing, being sure to really dredge up the flakes and garlic that had settled at the bottom of the jar. I let the sediment gather in the center of the mountain, which allowed the oil to cascade down and gather in all the natural nooks and crannies of the cottage cheese and fish.

That was it! A perfectly improvised meal, ready in less than 3 minutes.

These three ingredients worked marvelously together. The chili crisp and the pickled herring already have so much inherent flavor that there wasn’t much heavy lifting required on my part. As expected, the bright brininess of the fish merged perfectly with the bold punch of the oil, but neither drowned out the other.

The cottage cheese, meanwhile, tamed some of the chili oil’s heat while also providing body and a creamy mouthfeel. Plus, it added some light tang of its own. Notably, I used full fat cottage cheese, which is the only cottage cheese I think is worth using in any scenario (low-fat cottage cheese always tastes like mealy sadness to me).

This is an ingredient combo that may horrify some, mainly because so many people have wild notions about pickled herring, but I can assure you it works beautifully. I’m looking forward to experimenting with this dish — adding some dill for freshness; perhaps farro for chew; or maybe transforming the whole thing into some sort of dip. But even with no futzing, this three ingredient dish holds up nicely as a simple, easy meal.

The spirit of my father’s cottage cheese experimentation lives on.