Yogurt.

The creamy, tangy kitchen workhorse that does so much more than just provide you with an easy breakfast, snack or dip.

Welcome to ingredient, where once a month I take a deep dive into some of my favourite seasonal and store cupboard ingredients. This month I’m focusing on yogurt: the creamy, tangy fridge essential that can seemingly do everything from moisten cakes, tenderise meat and even act as the base for your next pot of yogurt.

Additionally, at the bottom of this post you’ll find my recipe for Cumin Roast Tomatoes with Lemony Yogurt, flexible to work as either a sauce-like spoonable side, or as a dip with one easy choose-your-own-adventure adjustment.

If you’re a paid subscriber, one of my go-to recipes for getting dinner on the table where yogurt is my secret ingredient, and a delicious, Middle Eastern-inspired recipe that never made it into One Pan Pescatarian are poised to land in your inboxes later in the month.

To receive these recipes, plus access all of the recipes from past newsletters as well as my Kitchen Cupboards interviews, you can upgrade your subscription here. And, if you fancy exploring the archives for more inspiration, last September we were focused on the very best of British plums:

Plums.

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I made yogurt almost from scratch for a client once.

I say almost from scratch because I took 2 tbsp from a tub of good, live yogurt and just over a litre of milk to make a much bigger pot: if it were not for the fact this method without a multi-cooker or yogurt maker (has anyone had success with the Instant Pot setting? I was always suspicious of those specific yogurt makers with associated cultures and refills) meant my oven had to be on very, very low for 8 long hours whilst the mixture nestled in my tea towel-lined Le Creuset, I’d call it the perfect recurring food. As long as you have a steady supply of milk, you can always use the end of a pot of yogurt to make the next.

A fridge-full of yogurt can come in many forms. I’m talking about proper dairy yogurt here (though coconut yogurt can be rather good), which spans from runny natural to thick Greek (which is just natural yogurt strained to thicken it which also ups the protein - make it at home and the leftover whey is great in bread or as a tenderiser for lamb chops -

Rosie Birkett

has a great recipe for this in her book The Joyful Home Cook which you should also buy for the excellent wild garlic yogurt flatbreads) or even labneh, an even-more-strained number that can span from swirlable and scoop able to little cheese-like balls perfect for rolling and marinating.

Homemade labneh made from straining Greek yogurt through an old, clean (!) pair of tights (see below!!) before being drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and za’tar.

Which: thick Greek (I like Fage, though Waitrose no.1 make a fantastic one) or thin natural (local-to-me Northiam Dairy makes my favourite, though the River Cottage one you can get in Whole Foods is also excellent, I also buy Yeo Valley in supermarkets) I keep to hand depends on what I’m going to be making on any given week.

For me, Greek yogurt is the yogurt that has structure and which clings to things: many of the Indian recipes I make calls for it to make sure the marinade sticks to pieces of chicken or lamb. You’ll often find yogurt in meat marinades as it acts as a wonderful tenderiser itself, and not just in whey form. Sweetened, it can also be swirled onto the top of cakes as a speedy, tangy frosting. Obviously it is also what I choose when I’m making Greek food, such as this excellent cucumber and Greek yogurt soup I blitz up every time it gets too hot to function in the kitchen. It also dollops well onto bowls of soup that are so thick you could stand your spoon up in them.

I know some people don’t like Greek yogurt for the way it’s thick, almost too-creamy character coats your tongue and the roof of your mouth, but I find something bracing about it, especially drizzled with good, floral honey, reminiscent of the two springtime school study trips I took around Greece as a teenager (I was studying classical civilisations - my knowledge of mythology remains excellent, though my Latin is somewhat sketchy and all that remains of my Ancient Greek is the alphabet!) where all of the food was absolutely terrible (as you’d expect on a school trip) except for the honey, yogurt, and bags of pizza chips bought from street vendors near the Acropolis.

My favourite Northiam Dairy natural yogurt, happily abundant in all our local farm shop!

Good, live natural yogurt, on the other hand tastes very different from the sterilised supermarket stuff, which is why I try to buy local where I can. It is almost too acidic and tangy on the tongue, you have to feel around for the underlying creaminess. It’s tart, almost sour (try it in place of cream in an Eton Mess and you’ll see how it’s natural acidity lightens and lifts a dish), reminding us why many cuisines turn to yogurt as a natural souring agent as well as to add something creamy. How thick it is depends on which one you buy, but it is all spoonable without the need to push it off the spoon as you need to with a dollop of the thicker Greek stuff: I stir it into marinades, use it for tenderising meats where I don’t intend for much of the marinade to cling when I cook it (in cases where it would burn quicker than the meat will cook) and it is my go-to both in the mornings topped with seasonal fresh fruits (as I proof read this before hitting send I’m looking forward to a bowlful topped with ripe French figs and local late-season raspberries), and for stirring a little mint sauce into to serve as an impromptu raita every time I make a curry (hat tip to James May of all people for that little gem!)

Other yogurts, of course, are available too. Goat yogurt is beautiful for adding depth and a farmyard-tang to proceedings. Flavoured yogurts are something that I usually find way too sweet and artificial, though there are a few exceptions: here in Kent up-the-road from my parents farm Ottie’s Dairy make an excellent black cherry and an also tasty lemon curd number (remember them if you’re in my neck of the woods as they also have a farm-fresh milk vending machine) and Fage’s coconut Greek yogurt is my current obsession, stirred through with toothsome shreds of coconut (though the strawberry flavour from the same range is sugar on a spoon).

Kefir is a fermented yogurt drink I’ve yet to get into, but which seems to have become so popular as a health food I’ve even spied it in the mini-corner shop Morrison’s we have here in the village. I’ve seen it well represented in my Ukrainian and Russian cookbooks so I think I must make it a resolution in this yogurt month to walk down and grab a bottle to give some recipes I’ve bookmarked with it a spin.

Skyr served with sugar and cream in Reykjavík, 2014.

A special mention also needs to go to Skyr, a Greek-yogurt style thick Icelandic yogurt which tastes richer and creamier without a lot of the tang of the Mediterranean stuff thanks to the Icelandic cultures it is made with. When I’ve seen it for sale here I’ve enjoyed it for breakfast (Siggi’s blueberry pots are also good), but for a traditional breakfast or dessert serve it with a portion of cream poured over the top, sprinkled with sugar as I had it served to me in a small cafe opposite the famous Hallgrímskirkja church in Reykjavík.

For this month’s first recipe, we’re leaning into yogurt’s sour notes with a choose-your-own yogurt base dish that works both as a spoonable side or as a scoopable dip, and which also I hope will help you tackle a tomato glut if you’ve got the same problem as I do at the moment (actually, my plants have been pretty pathetic in terms of yield this year, but people who know I’m an obsessive cook keep gifting me bowlfuls it is not in my DNA to say no to!)

Cumin Roast Tomatoes with Lemon Yogurt

Serves: 2 as a dip or side dish, Preparation time: 5 minutes, Cooking time: 40 minutes

Lemon zest adds a subtle perfume to yogurt without thinning it out the way lemon juice would, serving to accentuate yogurt’s natural sour notes. If you’re planning on spooning this onto plates of something like roast chicken thighs (completed with crispy skins) and some brown rice cooked in the same pan (so it absorbs all the cooking juices) you’ll want to use a natural yogurt here. It will be a bit too runny if this is destined to be scooped with flatbreads, however, so Greek would be the best option there.

I’ve listed the minimum amount of tomatoes you’ll want for this dish for things to taste good (I’m also very light on cherry tomatoes at the moment, it is cooking tomatoes I’m happily drowning in!), but feel free to load up on more if it is what you’ve got in the fridge as their smokily spiced, jammy sweetness also works well as the dominant flavour here, rather than acting in a sort of 50/50 split with the lemon yogurt.

For the Cumin Roast Tomatoes

• 300g cherry tomatoes (or small tomatoes halved)

• 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

• 1 tsp cumin seeds

• salt and pepper

• 1/2 tsp sugar

For the Lemon Yogurt

• 175g Greek or Natural yogurt (see headnote)

• zest of 1/2 small lemon

• flaky sea salt

• small handful fresh basil leaves, torn

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees. Toss the tomatoes in a baking dish just big enough to nestle them in a single layer (you want it crowded so juices form, but you also want the tops to caramelise once you sprinkle over the sugar) with the oil, cumin seeds, and a generous amount of salt and pepper. Roast for 30 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, stir the lemon zest through the yogurt.

3. Sprinkle the sugar over the tops of the tomatoes, and return them to the oven for a further 10 minutes.

4. Swirl the yogurt onto a serving dish before spooning the tomatoes and their juices on top. Finish with a scattering of flaky sea salt and the fresh basil. You can serve this immediately, or wait until the tomatoes are room temperature before adding them to the yogurt (good for entertaining as you can get ahead!)