make your own greek yogurt

Sometimes I feel like my free time is spent in constant research of how to recreate food from home here in my Barletta kitchen. I’ve gotten pretty good at this over the years. Here’s what I know: what store in town (yes, singular) carries oatmeal, where to buy maple syrup (even though it costs an arm and a leg) how I can make “fake bacon” (crisp up some prosciutto in the oven!) substitutes for cheddar during macaroni and cheese cravings, that you can make cookies without brown sugar (they’re just whiter) and now I can add “how to make greek yogurt” to this list.

It’s really simple. All you need is some plain yogurt and in no time at all, you can have creamy, luxurious greek-style yogurt. Think of all the money we’ll save! 

Here’s how you do it: Find a thin dishcloth (or a cheesecloth if you're fancy), a strainer, a bowl, and some plain yogurt. I used two small containers and it yielded only about 1/2 cup of yogurt in the end, so you might want to start with a larger amount. Drape the cloth over the strainer that's sitting in the bowl. Gather the cloth ends together and lightly squeeze - liquid will start to strain out of the yogurt. You can keep squeezing until you think most of the liquid has been strained out, or let time do the work for you by putting the whole thing in the fridge for a few hours until most of the liquid strains out. In the end you'll have super creamy greek yogurt! And if you want, you can let it strain for 24 hours and you'll practically have cheese!

Afterwards, you can dress up your greek yogurt as you normally would. Here I did my favorite: crisp apples and cinnamon!

Will you try this? 

Expats, what foods have you successfully recreated in your new home? 

P.S. A recipe to try with all that greek yogurt you'll have.