January Breakfast Club - Something Old, Something New, Something Yogurt

As a New Years resolution, I thought I should be participating more often in community blogging events than before, and as I saw the Breakfast Club challenge themed Yogurt, I knew I had to do something about it.

Breakfast Club: Because breakfast should be more interesting
than tea & toast or coffee & cereal.

Breakfast Club is a monthly challenge celebrating exciting things for breakfast hosted by Helen at Fuss Free Flavours and Sarah at Fingers and Toes. This month's Breakfast Club is hosted by Sarah from Maison Cupcake and the theme is YOGURT.

As a Bulgarian I have a special relationship with yogurt. First, every Bulgarian will tell you, that we live in the country of the Yogurt. Moreover the bacteria (well one of them) that makes the milk sour is called Lactobacilius Bulgaricus, hehe. It's a question of national identity :)

Yogurt has been so much popular in Bulgaria over the years, it had been fed to babies as one of their first foods and is even believed to boost longevity.

An interesting fact is that you can find many Bulgarian recipes from communist times for cakes without eggs but with lots of yogurt instead, while yogurt mostly doesn't exist as ingredient in Western cakes.

When I was a child my grand mothers would always make some cake or fritters with yogurt for breakfast.

As a reminiscence of this time and as I wanted to cook something less obvious than yogurt and granola, oats or or other healthy stuff, I chose this recipe for yogurt fritters with honey. Although I haven't had this fritters for years now, I really enjoyed them in my carefree childhood when the healthy nutrition trend was still dormant and less popular.

The rest of the breakfast table includes more yogurt - a minted and spiced Yogurt drink and a yogurt pannacotta topped with fresh mango. The thing is, I have been planning to make this pannacotta for a long time, thankfully I finally did.

I used Greek-style yogurt and Greek-style yogurt with honey to have richer taste.

Old-style yogurt fritters

400 gr wheat flour

15 g yeast

50 gr warm water

1 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1 egg

200 gr plain Greek style yogurt

100 gr grated feta cheese (optional)

200 ml vegetable oil for frying

honey for drizzling (or any favourite jam)

Method:

Activate the yeast in the water and add the sugar. Leave for 10-15 minutes to rise.

In a bowl mix the flour and the salt. In another bowl beat the egg and the yogurt together and add to the flour. Then add the activated yeast and start kneading until the dough is smooth and soft. Add the optional feta cheese. If the dough is too hard, soak your hands in warm water before kneading. Repeat as much as needed.

When the dough is ready leave it for 30-40 minutes in the bowl and cover with a damp cloth.

Heat the oil in a pan, divide the dough into five balls. Roll each ball lightly to 1 cm thickness and make different shapes with a cutter. I used a big round shape and then removed the middle using a piping nozzle. The remaining dough was made into balls.

Fry and eave on kitchen paper to absorb the oil.

Drizzle over runny honey.

Yogurt Pannacotta topped with Fresh Mango

Products (makes 4-5 pannacottas)

900 gr Greek-style yogurt with honey (I used Yeo Valley's)

2 sashets gellatine

200 ml water

1 fresh mango

Method:

Dissolve the gelatine according to pack instructions. Mix the yogurt very well and add the dissolved gelatine carefully. Then pour into moulds and leave in the fridge overnight to set.

Spiced and Minted Yogurt Drink

products: (makes 5 cups: )

3 cups plain yogurt

1 1/2 cups water

1 tbsp cardamom powder or the seeds crushed of 6-7 cardamom pods

3-4 sprigs mint - finely cut, reserve some leaves for decoration

Ice (optional) - depending on a season for me, so I skipped.

Method:

Blend the yoogurt, cardamon and mint very well, then add the water and continue blending until smooth.

Pour into glasses.