I used to love fried cheese sticks in high school and college and would even just order these as my meal in restaurants. Now that we don’t eat grains or vegetable oils, I decided that we needed to find a healthy version that we could make at home (and much cheaper too!).
In my many attempts to create an amazing cheese stick, I discovered that it’s important that the cheese is frozen to start (cut it into sticks and freeze it the day before) and that you layer enough egg and seasoned almond flour on these to make sure that the cheese is well-sealed inside and doesn’t leak out.
I typically use tallow to fry these in. I like it’s mild flavor and healthy fat profile. Not familiar with tallow? I write more about it in my post for parsnip fries (which are delicious!) and buy it from Thrive Market. You can re-use your tallow or lard several times — just store it in the fridge.
If you don’t want to fry (and potentially eat!) a whole batch at once, you could also bread the cheese sticks and then freeze them to fry a couple at a time as needed.
After some trial and error (and lots of burnt cheese), I’m happy with this recipe …
Fried Cheese Sticks Recipe
Ingredients
- 8 oz mozzarella cheese cut into sticks
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp water
- ½ cup almond flour
- 1 tsp Italian seasoning
- ½ tsp Himalayan salt
- 1-2 cups of tallow lard, or coconut oil for frying
Instructions
- The day before you are planning to make, or at least 3-4 hours before, put cheese sticks in the freezer on a plate.
- Once cheese is completely frozen, put the tallow, lard, or oil in a small pan so that it is about an inch deep and bring to medium high heat ... it needs to be hot before the cheese goes in.
- While the fat is preheating, crack the eggs into a medium bowl and beat with water until creamy.
- Combine the almond flour, Italian seasoning, and salt on a medium plate.
- Remove the cheese from the freezer and dip each stick first in the egg mixture, then in the almond flour mixture, then back in the egg mixture and repeat if necessary until well coated. They need to be coated completely so they seal and the cheese can't escape.
- Drop 3 or 4 at a time into the heated oil for a couple of minutes until they are starting to brown.
- Carefully remove. I removed them with a flat pasta scoop (finally, a good use for it), but a slotted spoon will work too ... you just don't want to squeeze them with tongs or poke with a fork, as the cheese will escape and make a big mess.
- Repeat these steps with the remaining cheese until they are all cooked.
Notes
Nutrition
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What was your favorite “bad” food before switching to a real food diet? Do you like cheese sticks? Share below!
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Sounds tasty, but missing the part where they are healthy? Regular Mozz cheese, plus still frying them? Have you tried something like Lisanatti Mozz “cheese”? That would lower the fat content a little bit.. and then maybe baking them with a spray of oil around the breading? Just my thoughts.
Fat isn’t the problem: https://wellnessmama.com/743/guide-to-fat/
We make GF cheese sticks at home too. I find it a timesaver to just use organic string cheese, I normally bake them instead of frying.
I want to try this ,but I’m scared!
I have used a recipe similar to this to make other foods also. Think chicken tenders (chicken nuggets), fish sticks, breaded veges (the really hard solid ones need to be steamed a little first) etc.. Almost any fried foods version can be lightened up and cooked this way. Just change up your spices to fit into your taste preferences.
Where do you find “healthy” cheese? What do you look for and not look for in cheese?
I prefer to buy local and organic whenever possible…
Do you think I could re-freeze them after breading them, so they would be ready to pull from the freezer and go in the fryer at a later time?
How many times do you re-use the tallow for frying before you discard it? thanks
I really like your site. I think this recipe is great too.. Thank you.. I substitute almonds with grated Parmesan cheese, roll the sticks and freeze for two hours before frying.