Shanklish substitute

Best substitute

Feta mashed with olive oil and rolled in za'atar

Use the same amount by weight as the shanklish you are replacing

Best for shanklish plates with tomato, onion and olive oil

Different taste

The standard workaround and the one most Levantine cooks abroad reach for. Mash a block feta with a fork, work in a teaspoon of olive oil per hundred grams so it holds together, roll it into walnut-sized balls and coat them thickly in za'atar or dried thyme. What changes: feta is brined and tangy, so the salt and the sourness are right, but it is a young cheese and it tastes clean and bright where shanklish tastes aged, deep and faintly barnyardy. Served crumbled with tomato, onion and olive oil the difference is smaller than you would expect, because the za'atar coating does a great deal of the identifying work.

Other shanklish substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Feta plus a little blue cheese, rolled in za'atar
Close match
4 parts feta to 1 part blue cheese by weight, used 1:1 for the shanklish
The best approximation on this page, and the reason is straightforward: well-aged shanklish develops surface mould, and the pungency it gains from that is in the same flavour family as blue cheese.
What changes
Adding a small amount of Roquefort, Danish blue or Gorgonzola supplies the aged, slightly funky, back-of-the-throat sharpness that feta simply does not have. What changes: it lands genuinely close for aged shanklish, close enough that people who grew up with it recognise the profile. Go beyond about a fifth blue cheese and it tips over into tasting like blue cheese with herbs on it, which is a different dish.
Best for
aged or well-ripened shanklish, mezze plates where shanklish is the star, crumbling into salads and over roast vegetables, impressing someone who knows the real thing
Mash the two together thoroughly with a fork before rolling, so you do not get pockets of blue. Start with less blue cheese than the ratio suggests and taste, since strength varies enormously - Roquefort is far more assertive than a mild Danish blue. Both cheeses are salty, so the dish needs no extra salt at all.
3Aged or dry goat cheese with dried thyme
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight, plus salt to taste
A good option if you can find a firm, crumbly, properly aged chevre rather than the soft fresh log.
What changes
Aged goat cheese has a genuine tang and a faint animal note that pulls in exactly the direction shanklish goes, which fresh cow's milk cheeses cannot manage. What changes: most aged goat cheese is much less salty than shanklish, so you must season it yourself and be generous about it. It is also creamier and less crumbly, and the goat character is more nutty-sour than the fermented sharpness of shanklish. Roll it in dried thyme or za'atar and it makes a very respectable plate.
Best for
mezze plates, salads with tomato and onion, spreading on bread, cooks who prefer a less salty cheese
Look for the drier, harder aged rounds rather than the fresh log, which will not hold a ball shape and tastes like nothing in comparison. If all you can get is fresh chevre, drain it in a sieve overnight and salt it well first.
4Ricotta salata or dry curd cheese with salt and za'atar
Different taste
Use the same amount by weight, plus salt
The right choice specifically for young shanklish, which is firmer, drier and considerably milder than the aged kind - a plain salty herb-crusted ball rather than a pungent one.
What changes
Ricotta salata is pressed, salted and dried, so it crumbles well and holds a shape, and farmer cheese or dry curd cheese behaves similarly. What changes: no age and no funk at all. You get a clean, milky, salty crumble with the herb crust on top, which is a pleasant thing to eat with bread and tomatoes but has none of the sharp depth that makes shanklish memorable. Add a squeeze of lemon to lift it.
Best for
young or mild shanklish, mezze plates for people who dislike pungent cheese, crumbling over salads, children and cautious eaters
Ricotta salata is already salted; farmer cheese and dry curd generally are not, so taste before seasoning. If you want to push it toward aged shanklish, this is the base to add a small amount of blue cheese to.
5Labneh balls preserved in oil, rolled in za'atar
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by volume
Shanklish's mild younger cousin, and the closest thing in form: drained yogurt cheese rolled into balls, coated in herbs and kept under olive oil in a jar.
What changes
If the recipe or the plate treats shanklish as one item among many on a mezze spread, these do the job convincingly and look right. What changes: labneh is fresh, so you get lactic dairy tang, creaminess and the herb aroma but no salt-preserved intensity and no fermented age - the flavour is soft-edged where shanklish is sharp. Salt the labneh well before rolling, which also helps the balls hold together.
Best for
mezze plates and breakfast spreads, eating with flatbread and olives, when shanklish is one item among several rather than the focus
Strain the labneh hard - a day or two in cheesecloth in the fridge - or the balls will slump. Once rolled, keep them submerged in olive oil in the fridge and they improve over a week or two as they firm up and take on the herb flavour.
6Accepting there is no substitute
Taste and texture differ
Worth saying plainly.
What changes
Shanklish is a mould-ripened, thyme-crusted yogurt cheese that has been salted and aged for weeks or months, and nothing in a Western supermarket tastes like it. Every option above is an approximation of one aspect - the salt, the crumble, the herb crust, the funk - and the honest best combination is feta with a little blue cheese, mashed with olive oil and rolled thickly in za'atar. If shanklish is the entire point of what you are making, and there is a Middle Eastern grocer within reach, buy the real thing: it keeps for months in oil in the fridge and a single container lasts a long time because you use very little at a time.
Best for
deciding whether to substitute at all, recipes where shanklish is the only flavour source
Shanklish is sold at Syrian and Lebanese grocers in tubs, sometimes vacuum-packed, in both young and aged grades. Ask which you are being sold - the difference between them is much larger than the difference between most cheeses.

What is Shanklish?

Shanklish is Shanklish, also spelled shinklish and known as surke in parts of Syria, is a Syrian and Lebanese cheese made from soured, drained yogurt curd that is salted, hand-rolled into balls, coated in za'atar or dried thyme and then aged for weeks or months until it turns sharply pungent.

Cooking tips

Shanklish is served crumbled and cold, never melted. It is a salt-and-acid-set aged cheese with very little of the stretch proteins that let mozzarella or kashkaval melt, so heat makes it go grainy and weep fat rather than flow. If a recipe has you heating it, it will be scattered over something hot at the end rather than cooked into it.
The classic plate is the whole recipe: crumble the cheese into a shallow dish, add finely diced tomato and very finely diced onion, pour over a generous amount of good olive oil, and eat it with flatbread. Some cooks add chopped mint or a squeeze of lemon. Any substitute you make should be served this way, because the tomato and oil are what carry the salt.
Whatever cheese you substitute, coat it in za'atar or dried thyme. The herb crust is a defining part of shanklish rather than a garnish, and it is the single cheapest thing you can do to make a bowl of crumbled feta read as shanklish. Roll the balls in it and let them sit for an hour so the aroma transfers.
Taste for salt before you add any to the dish. Shanklish is preserved with salt and is very salty indeed, and so are feta, blue cheese and ricotta salata - a salad built around any of them almost never needs additional seasoning, only acid and oil.
Check which grade of shanklish a recipe wants. Young shanklish is firm, pale and fairly mild; well-aged shanklish, sometimes sold as surke, is darker, softer, and pungent enough to dominate everything on the plate. Substituting mild ricotta salata for the aged kind, or blue-spiked feta for the young kind, will both feel wrong even though each is a reasonable swap for the other grade.

Frequently asked questions

What does shanklish taste like?

Very salty, sharply tangy, and distinctly aged - the sourness of yogurt concentrated and then left to develop for weeks, with a pungent, slightly barnyardy depth that some people compare to a mild blue cheese and others to a very strong feta. The za'atar or thyme coating adds a warm herbal aroma over the top. Young shanklish is much gentler and reads closer to a firm salty feta. It is a strong cheese by any standard, eaten in small amounts.

Can I just leave shanklish out?

If it is one item on a mezze table, yes - swap in feta, labneh or olives and nobody will feel short-changed. If the dish is a shanklish plate or a salad built around it, then no, because the cheese is supplying essentially all of the salt, the acid and the pungency, and without it you have chopped tomato and onion in oil. In that case make the substitute rather than skipping it: feta with a little blue cheese, mashed with olive oil and rolled in za'atar.

Is shanklish the same as feta?

No. Both are white, salty and crumbly, but feta is a brined young cheese made from milk and kept wet, while shanklish is made from soured and drained yogurt curd, salted, shaped into balls, coated in herbs and aged in air or under oil for weeks or months. That ageing gives shanklish a pungency and depth feta does not have. Feta is still the most practical substitute, and adding a small amount of blue cheese to it is what closes most of the gap.

Is shanklish a blue cheese?

Not in the sense of being deliberately inoculated with blue mould, but well-aged shanklish does develop surface mould as it ripens, and its pungency comes partly from that. This is exactly why blending a little Roquefort or Danish blue into feta produces such a convincing imitation - you are borrowing the same class of flavour. Producers usually rinse or brush the mould off before packing, so what you buy in a tub looks like a plain herb-coated cheese ball.

How do I store shanklish?

In the fridge, ideally submerged in olive oil in a sealed jar, which is how it is traditionally kept and how it will last for months. Always use a clean dry spoon and top the oil back up so the remaining balls stay covered. Kept dry in a container it will keep hardening and the surface will dry out and crack, though it stays edible for a long time - shanklish is a preserved cheese by design and it is very difficult to spoil quickly.

Related substitutes

More cheese substitutes

Shanklish substitute

Other shanklish substitutes

2Feta plus a little blue cheese, rolled in za'atar

3Aged or dry goat cheese with dried thyme

4Ricotta salata or dry curd cheese with salt and za'atar

5Labneh balls preserved in oil, rolled in za'atar

6Accepting there is no substitute