Greek Yogurt

I love love love greek yogurt.  Recently I've been eating maybe 2 containers of it a day.  I buy the Trader Joe's Organic fat free kind.  My favorite is vanilla, probably have one a day, then I use like 1/2 cup of the plain kind to make smoothies. 

Is this a good food choice? I eat it as a snack at work mostly in between breakfast and lunch or lunch and dinner.  I don't get a ton of other dairy- skim milk with cereal sometimes, but on those days I don't make a smoothie. 

Anyone else looooove greek yogurt?  What is your fav?

I've never had greek yogurt....How is it different than "regular" yogurt?

I can say that yogurt (light) is a great snack choice.  I love Yoplait light and    Yo-plus which has added fiber.  Lots of great flavors!  I've tried different kinds and these are my favorite.  Some I've tried tend to taste very "diet" or have a weird texture.

Trish

If you do a search here on CC for "Greek yogurt", loads of threads will come up and people have posted a lot of good suggestions for things to add to greek yogurt to make it more delicious. 

Greek yogurt is better than regular yogurt (i.e. Dannon, Yoplait, etc.) because it is lower in sugar and higher in protein. The major difference is the texture, which is thicker for Greek yogurt.

Greek yogurt to me was aquired taste as it reminds me of sour cream but if you add your own fruit or mixtures to make it sweeter it tastes good. It is a lot higher in protein

Try the vanilla flavor! It's yummy. I prefer it to plain.

I've been looking for it, but I don't think we have it in Canada... or Saskatchewan anyways.

do any Canadians know where to get it?

I eat Fage 0% everyday...either for breakfast with Splenda and fruit or as desert with  Splenda and cinnamon, apple butter or pumpkin butter, pumpkin pie spice..sometime I add in fat free redi whip, makes it awesome.  Today I added a tbs of sunflower butter in it and had it for snack.

I also use the plain one to make taziki sauce with grated garlic and cucumbers to eat with fresh veggies as dip, spread on a sandwich or use as a coleslaw dressing.

This weekend I am making a lemon yogurt cake with greek yogurt...I love to bake :)

We don't have a TJ, so I just buy the plain one at the store.

Greek yogurt is delicious!

I find its really good as a spread also, often I'll mix a little balsamic vinegar and herbs with it and put it on sandwiches or something. Surprisingly, its really tasty if you mix a bit with canned tuna, then throw in some veggies like canned tomatoes or cut up cucumbers. Also, its good sweet, like if you put some on toast with cut up apples and cinnamon, its sort of like an apple cinnamon roll! Only healthy haha.

If you can't find it in stores, you can basically make it with a cheesecloth and nonfat regular yogurt.  Greek yogurt is really just strained yogurt.  It's great for you, very protein dense and a good source of calcium and no sugar or fat.

Original Post by carmenxox:

I've been looking for it, but I don't think we have it in Canada... or Saskatchewan anyways.

do any Canadians know where to get it?

Apparently sometimes it's called Mediterreanean Yoghurt in Canada? Try to find a greek grocery shop, or make your own :)

I got a container of unsweetened Oikos on sale. It was still about twice as expensive as regular yogurt.  It was very thick, and I used it for starter in the yogurt maker.  The resulting yogurt was thicker than my regular home-made (for which I used Dannon as starter), but not as thick as Oikos out of the container.  Two months later it's still making that thick yogurt, so the cultures are robust.  Flavor is about the same, and I like the thicker texture.

thhq,

I make my own yogurt also. The greek yogurt sounds great as a starter. I want to use non-fat milk, so how much of the greek stuff should I use as a starter? The entire container (6-8oz)?

And 2 months! Wow. Do you mean that you use the yogurt you started with the cultures and save some from that batch to start the next, I assume?

Thanks!

baylily, I make mine a quart at a time.  Normally I use my own yogurt as a starter, two tablespoons to a quart of scalded and cooled milk.  Lately I've been using 2%, but I haven't found that 1% or skim are any different.

Sometimes we eat up all the yogurt and I have to open a fresh container from the store for starter.  But I've found that my home-made yogurt works just as well as what I get from a container of Dannon or Oikos. 

Great, thhq.  Thanks so much for the tips. I can't wait to make up a batch with the greek starter!