Luxurious Middle Eastern cheese made from yogurt, flavored with nuts, herbs, and spices.
Labneh with Olives, Pistachios and Oregano
A hint of the Middle East in your kitchen. Try your hand at turning yogurt into a luxurious Middle Eastern cheese. This recipe may seem a bit technical, but it isn’t really, providing you get started a day ahead. Serve the labneh with minimum graces: spoon inside chunks of good, crusty bread and top with tomato.
Ingredients
- 450g goat’s yogurt (optional—can use regular yogurt)
- 450g natural yogurt
- Coarse sea salt
- 20 green olives, pitted
- 1½ tbsp roughly chopped fresh oregano
- 1 tbsp chopped parsley
- Grated zest of 2 lemons
- 1 small garlic clove, crushed
- 100ml olive oil
- 20g pistachios, lightly toasted
- 20g pine nuts or walnuts, lightly toasted
- 3 ripe tomatoes
- ½ a small red onion, thinly sliced
Directions
Line a deep bowl with a coffee filter. In another bowl, stir the two yogurts and half a teaspoon of salt, pour into the filter, place in a sieve, and leave over a bowl for 24-36 hours. After this time, much of the liquid should have drained out and the remaining yogurt will turn thick and quite dry; the centre may still be creamy.
Remove the labneh from the cloth and transfer to a serving platter. Spread it over the plate with the back of a spoon, creating a loose, wavy pattern about 2cm thick.
Next, roughly chop the olives and put them in a bowl with the oregano, parsley, lemon zest, garlic and olive oil (reserving two tablespoons of the oil for the tomatoes). Use a pestle and mortar to crush the nuts roughly, leaving some just broken and others finely crushed. Stir into the olive mix, then spoon this over the labneh, leaving a border of about 2cm around the edge (if you want your labneh a bit milder, don’t use the whole quantity), then sprinkle with chilli.
Finally, cut the tomatoes into thick wedges and mix with the sliced onion. Arrange on a side plate next to the labneh, sprinkle with salt and drizzle with the reserved olive oil. Serve the labneh and tomatoes with torn chunks of bread.