Kasar Cheese substitute

Best substitute

Kashkaval or Kasseri

Use the same amount as the kasar cheese you are replacing

Best for pide and lahmacun

Close match

These are the same cheese made in neighbouring countries, Bulgarian and Balkan kashkaval and Greek kasseri, produced by the same stretched-curd method and used for exactly the same jobs.

Other kasar cheese substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Low-Moisture Mozzarella
Different taste
Use the same amount
The workhorse substitute.
What changes
Like kasar it is a pasta filata cheese, meaning the curd is stretched, which is the reason both melt into long elastic strands rather than breaking into oil and solids.
Best for
pide, tost, borek, pizza-style bakes, anything where stretch matters
The melt is right, the flavour is not: mozzarella is markedly blander and less salty, so a Turkish tost made with it tastes flat. Fix it by using three parts mozzarella to one part provolone or mild cheddar, or simply salt the cheese lightly as you grate it. Use the block sold for pizza, not fresh mozzarella packed in water, which will flood the pastry.
3Provolone (dolce, the mild kind)
Close match
Use the same amount
Another stretched-curd cheese, so it melts with the same smooth elasticity, and it has considerably more savoury depth than mozzarella, which puts the flavour closer to a properly matured kasar.
What changes
Best for
tost and toasted sandwiches, pide, borek, melted cheese dishes
Buy provolone dolce. The aged piccante version is sharp and tangy in a way that reads distinctly Italian and will make a Turkish sandwich taste like an Italian one. Provolone is also a little oilier when melted, so if you are making tost in a press, expect a bit more fat to run out at the edges. A half-and-half mix with mozzarella is the best of both.
4Young Gouda or Edam
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount
Mild, buttery, faintly sweet and a solid melter, which makes it a comfortable everyday stand-in for young kasar.
What changes
Best for
tost, pide, breakfast plates, melted toppings, cheese and bread
Gouda melts creamily rather than stretching, so you lose most of the long cheese pull that makes a pide look good. It is also sweeter and less salty, which is fine in a sandwich and slightly odd in a savoury borek with spinach or minced beef. Edam is the drier and more neutral of the two and slices well for a breakfast plate.
5Gruyere or Emmental
Different taste
Use the same amount
Both melt superbly without splitting, and a small amount blended with mozzarella gives a rich, satisfying melted cheese with real character.
What changes
Best for
tost, baked dishes, pide, gratin-style bakes
They taste nothing like kasar. Gruyere is nutty and savoury with a farmyard edge and Emmental is sweet and mildly fruity, so a Turkish tost made with either becomes a very good cheese toastie rather than a tost. Use them where you want a delicious result and are not chasing authenticity, or use a quarter Gruyere to three quarters mozzarella to add depth without hijacking the flavour.
6Mild or Medium Cheddar
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount ideally blended half and half with mozzarella
The cheese most likely to be in the fridge, and it works if you manage it, since it is salty and savoury in roughly the right range.
What changes
Best for
tost, quick weeknight melts, baked cheese dishes
Cheddar is a crumbly-curd cheese, not a stretched-curd one, so on heating it goes greasy and can split into oily pools with grainy solids, and it gives no stretch whatsoever. Blending it half and half with low-moisture mozzarella solves both problems and gets you a salty, stretchy melt. Avoid mature or extra-sharp cheddar, whose tang overwhelms everything else in a pide.
7Kefalotyri or Kefalograviera (for aged kasar)
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount
If your recipe calls for old kasar, eski kasar, to be grated over pasta, soup or a baked dish, these hard Greek sheep milk cheeses are the correct swap.
What changes
Best for
grating over pasta and manti, baked dishes, soups, fried cheese
These are for the grating role, not the melting role. They are saltier, sharper and much drier than young kasar, so using them inside a tost gives you a salty, slightly gritty result that does not pull. Kefalograviera is the milder and slightly more melting of the two, so it is the better choice if you need a cheese to do both jobs.

What is Kasar Cheese?

Kasar Cheese is Kasar cheese, written kasar peyniri in Turkish and sold elsewhere as kashkaval or kasseri, is a pale yellow stretched-curd sheep or cow milk cheese that is mild, buttery and slightly salty when young and melts into long smooth strands.

Cooking tips

Kasar's job is the melt. It provides fat, mild savoury flavour and above all stretch, because the curd has been stretched during production. When you substitute, ask whether your recipe needs melt (choose mozzarella, provolone, kashkaval) or grating and salt (choose kefalotyri, kefalograviera, aged kashkaval). Getting this backwards is why cheese pide sometimes comes out gritty.
Moisture is the enemy of pide and borek. Grate the cheese and, if it feels damp, spread it on kitchen paper for ten minutes before it goes on the dough. Fresh mozzarella from water is the classic error: it steams inside the pastry and leaves a wet, collapsed base.
Grate kasar and its substitutes from cold. Semi-soft yellow cheese smears and gums up the grater at room temperature, so give the block twenty minutes in the freezer first if it is soft.
For a Turkish tost, butter the outside of the bread rather than the inside and press it in a hot sandwich press or under a weighted pan until the cheese is fully liquid. Kasar and its stand-ins need genuine heat to stretch, and a lukewarm press gives you warm bread with solid cheese in the middle.
There are two grades in Turkish shops: taze kasar, which is young, springy and mild and is what you want for melting, and eski kasar, which is hard, sharp and made for grating. If you buy the wrong one, no substitution advice will save the recipe, so check the label.

Frequently asked questions

Can I just leave kasar out?

Not in cheese pide, kasarli tost or karisik borek, where the melted cheese is the dish. In a mixed borek or a stuffed vegetable where kasar is one of several fillings, you can leave it out and the result will simply be leaner and less rich. If you have no melting cheese at all, low-moisture mozzarella with a pinch of salt is a far better answer than omission.

Is kasar the same as kashkaval or kasseri?

For all practical purposes, yes. Kasar peyniri in Turkey, kashkaval across Bulgaria and the Balkans, and kasseri in Greece are all stretched-curd sheep or cow milk cheeses made the same way and used the same way. Any of them can replace another one for one. Regional differences come down to milk type and ageing, with sheep milk versions tasting richer and older ones tasting sharper and saltier.

Is mozzarella a good substitute for kasar?

Yes, provided you use the low-moisture block sold for pizza rather than fresh mozzarella in brine. It melts and stretches the same way because it is made by the same stretching process. The one shortfall is flavour: mozzarella is much milder and less salty than kasar, so blend in a quarter of provolone or mild cheddar, or salt it lightly, and the difference largely disappears.

What is the best cheese for Turkish pide if I cannot find kasar?

A blend of three parts low-moisture mozzarella to one part provolone, grated and patted dry. That gives you the long stretch and the savoury saltiness of kasar in a combination available in almost any supermarket. Some cooks add a spoonful of crumbled feta or beyaz peynir for tang, which is a traditional Turkish mixture rather than a compromise.

Can I use beyaz peynir or feta instead of kasar?

Only if you accept a completely different result. Beyaz peynir and feta are fresh brined cheeses that soften and weep when heated but never flow or stretch, so a pide made with them is salty and crumbly rather than gooey. Many Turkish recipes deliberately use both, kasar for the melt and beyaz peynir for the salt, which is a better plan than substituting one for the other.

Related substitutes

More cheese substitutes

Kasar Cheese substitute

Other kasar cheese substitutes

2Low-Moisture Mozzarella

3Provolone (dolce, the mild kind)

4Young Gouda or Edam

5Gruyere or Emmental

6Mild or Medium Cheddar

7Kefalotyri or Kefalograviera (for aged kasar)