Patsy’s Cookbook
July 18, 2018
Food with Friends
August 1, 2021Sweet and Savory Recipes for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner
by By Janet Fletcher
A fresh, modern yogurt-centric cookbook that showcases the versatility of this dairy superstar in more than 50 recipes for appetizers, salads, soups, sauces, marinades, beverages, and desserts, and provides fail-proof directions for making your own yogurt at home.
Americans have fallen in love with yogurt, thanks to its creamy texture, tangy flavor, and health-promoting probiotic cultures. In Yogurt, a fresh and modern full-color cookbook, author Janet Fletcher introduces recipes, from roasted tomato bruschetta with yogurt cheese to meatballs in a warm yogurt sauce to a golden yogurt cake, that showcase yogurt in dishes both rustic and sophisticated. Drawing inspiration from the culinary traditions of Greece, Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, India, and beyond, this useful handbook includes a guide to purchasing yogurt (all of the recipes work with quality store-bought brands), advice on choosing a yogurt maker, and easy methods for making yogurt, Greek yogurt, and yogurt cheese at home.
TSG Review
Before I started reviewing this book I would not eat yogurt at all. I thought it was gross and the last time i tried it I think I was probably like 7 years old. Well, turns out, not only do I like yogurt but I had been eating it frequently without ever knowing it! My favorite dishes I enjoy at Indian and Greek restaurants have yogurt as a sauce base like in my tikka masala and gyros. Anyway, this was a great surprise of a cookbook. It has easy to follow recipes with the few ingredients, with beautiful pictures on very nice thick paper stock. She even teaches you how to make your own yogurt simply with a tablespoon of culture, milk, a thermometer, and blankets to keep it warm during incubation.
Grilled Zucchini with Yogurt Sauce, Feta, Lemon & Dill
Serves 4
Lots of ingredients for a side dish but not a lot of work, really. Sitting in a bed of garlic flavored yogurt, perfectly grilled zucchini is then topped with cheese, lemon zest, crushed peppers, and fresh dill. I have been adding this vegetable side dish to fish and chicken dishes with fabulous results. I particularly enjoy this next to a tuna steak. It is so flavorful that on a few occasions I have just eaten this for my main meal. This was also the first recipe I made from the book not thinking I would enjoy it due to my hatred for yogurt. I've hated yogurt since childhood till I got this book and tried my first recipe. So, if this book makes a lover out of someone like me
Harissa-Roasted Chicken with Sweet Peppers
Serves 6
Out of all the recipes this one was the least interesting for me. I thought the flavor was flat and not exciting at all. It has a very long marinade prep and and for all that I didn't notice that it infused any flavor into the chicken. I also had a bit of trouble tracking down the Harissa paste, if you live any distance away from a metropolitan area you might find this difficult to locate as well. For me, it was a much longer cooking time than the recipe said and the clean up was pretty difficult. Lastly, mine looked nothing like the picture when I finished, it had none of that nice roasted brown color and my vegetables were severely over done. I can not recomend this recipe but I have a new ingredient, Harissa, that I am having fun learning how to use.
Grilled Hanger Steak with Grilled Red Onion Raita
Serves 4
This is a mic-drop cookbook recipe if I ever saw one. Perfectly grilled steak served with a fantastic sauce that compliments it perfectly. The sauce tastes of a tzatziki but with cumin onion and cilantro instead of cucumber and dill. To round out the flavor of the sauce the author adds fresh garlic, cilantro, and toasted mustard seeds. Together with the steak it is reminiscent of a steak gyro. I did have trouble finding hanger steak but talked to my butcher and he recommended using flank steak instead. It's a thicker cut of meat but the texture is similar. It is also less expensive usually and taste better.
This is just another of the many recipes I have put into my meal planning rotation since starting this book.
