How do I take plain yogurt and make it yummy with fruit?

Add two tablespoons of chocolate syrup, some M&Ms, a ground up Heath Bar, ...... and one raisin. Delicious.

Any fruit will work.

Use berry (any berry) jam or preserves. Commercial product is augmented with extra sugars.

If you are looking for a healthy alternative, choose your fresh fruit and just dice it up and mix with the yogurt. It’s delicious without extra sugar.

I use vanilla yogurt for a bit of sweetness then cut up bananas, blueberries and a few walnuts.

Honey and fruit is a great combo. A spoonful of raw honey has many health benefits and is a healthy sweetener. Or, fresh blackberries or strawberries lightly sweetend are great too!

I like to mix vanilla yogurt with orange marmalade. I’ve used plain as well but I prefer the vanilla. I’ve got some pecan syrup that I’ve been meaning to mix with yogurt to check the taste, I still have to get the yogurt.

Honey or real maple syrup to sweeten it, granola, berries, pineapple, banana is easy, orange….dried cranberries, almonds, anything!

@janbb That would have been great, but I am in this dilemma because I bought a large container of plain yogurt to make an Indian food recipe, and then it only called for half a cup!

Use frozen strawberries, let them thaw, then puree them in the blender with a little bit of honey.

Or puree some fresh pineapple and banana in the blender.

If you want something a little bit different (rather than the usual fruity blends eaten in the US) take a couple of leaves of mint and an equal amount of basil, maybe about a Tablespoon, total and put that and about a cup of yogurt into the blender and whirl. This is very refreshing and you can also use it as a dip or sauce for other things, especially middle easter or Greek food, but you can also eat it just like that or you can thin it down a bit with ice water and drink it. One of the Lebanese restaurants that I go to, serves a similar drink in a bottle. It’s not supposed to be sweet, it’s more like buttermilk or a lassi.

@Kardamom What – no links? How do we know it’s you?

@janbb I was too busy playing linky-poo on @Jude’s Q about the Indian food. : P

Although I just found this Basil and Strawberry Lassi Recipe that will work for both Q’s.

See, it’s me!

First, if you want really good yoghurt, you’ll want to thicken it. You can buy Greek style yoghurt at three or four times the price of regular, but why bother? Get some cheese cloth, plop your yoghurt into it, and let the water percolate out until it’s nice and thick. To sweeten it, I recommend using stevia concentrate. Stevia is an herb, the concentrate of which is hundreds of times sweeter than sugar, has no calories, and no side effects. This is what I use. A few drops is all you need. Alternatively, you can add honey to the yoghurt for sweetness if you don’t mind the calories.

For flavour, you can’t go wrong with vanilla. Real vanilla, not that awful “artificial vanilla flavouring” they sell in the supermarkets. If you have the time, you can make your own vanilla extract very easily for a fraction of the price you’ll pay at the store: buy a vanilla bean and drop it in a small bottle of vodka. Leave it for a month. Voila, you have homemade vanilla extract.

Any kind of fruit or berry preserves or compotes also go well with yoghurt. I’m partial to strawberry preserves, myself. If you want a very easy, simple way to make apple compote, peel an apple. Put it in the microwave until it turns mushy, then mash it with a fork. Voila, instant compote.

Like @Kardamom, I use frozen fruits (berries my favorite) and will let them defrost in a bowl until there’s syrupy liquid to mix in too. Frozen peaches are tasty too but I like to puree them first and then mix in.

I use yogurt in smoothies or dice fruit into it. I put strawberries, blueberries and more in yogurt.
I use Stoney Fields or Trader Joe’s Banana Yogurt.

@SmashTheState The Stevia does not have a bitter aftertaste?

Anyone know if you can use fruit butters in yogurt?

@marinelife Some people I know claim stevia has a bitter aftertaste, but I can’t taste it. YMMV. I don’t like the stevia powders – which are bitter – because stevia is so sweet that they have to use fillers (like xylitol) to bulk it out to make it usable, and these fillers may be bitter. I use the liquid concentrate which has a simple glycerin base for volume, which has no taste. If you use a lot of stevia it has a very faint licorice flavour, but since I like licorice, this isn’t a problem for me.

I put blueberries in everything. The saying should actually be “some blueberries everyday keep the doctor away”.

@Blackberry Not some Blackberry every day?

Mix in bananas and drizzle honey over plain yogurt. Yummy!

You can cook any tangy fruit with some honey and mix it into plain yogurt. Even quicker and healthier, try a fruit salad with whatever fresh fruits you like. Make the dressing by simply mixing plain yogurt and bee pollen. Easy, tasty and healthy. If you want more protien, throw in some sunflower seeds, crushed walnuts, or whatever nuts you like.

@janbb I’m not always available to be eaten.

@marinelife Incidentally, if you have lots of yoghurt left and don’t know what to do with it, it’s really good for making baked goods instead of using milk. For a healthy alternative to guacamole, I also like to make this recipe for asparagus guacamole, but add fat-free plain yoghurt to make it a little creamier and more like real guacamole.

@SmashTheState Now there’s a creative use of yogurt.

@Blackberry Dang!

@marinelife If your objective is to use up the plain yoghurt, and you have some fruited yoghurts on hand, use the plain to “dilute” the fruited ones. I always do this, as the fruited yoghurts are overly sweet for my taste. I use about ⅓ fruited to ⅔ plain to get the right balance for me.

Another savory alternative—you can use plain yogurt to thicken up soups instead of using cream or half and half. Actually, you can use it in almost any recipe that calls for a high fat content milk product. I’ve had mashed potatoes made with yogurt and they were very good.

Yes, if you simply want to use the yogurt in other creative ways, here’s a few ideas:

Yogurt Marinated Chicken Kebabs

Spicy Yogurt Dip with Walnuts (Note: the labneh called for in this recipe is just yogurt that has been thickened by putting a coffee filter or cheese cloth into a net strainer, over a pan, and putting your yogurt into this set-up in the fridge, usually over night, to let the excess moisture drain off into the pan, you’re left with creamy, thick yogurt)

Turkish Yogurt Soup

Triple Lemon Yogurt Cake

Deviled Eggs with Yogurt

Orange Muffins with Yogurt

Yogurt Hollandaise Sauce

Artichoke and Spinach Dip with Yogurt

Cucumber Mint Raita (This is an Indian condiment used to cool the tastebuds when eating spicy curries, but you can use it as a dip for chips and veggies or a spread on a sandwich, especially with tuna fish)

Mango Lassi (A tasty Indian “smoothie” that’s also used to tame the spiciness of the curries. I would rather drink this than a chocolate malt any day of the week, it’s so good!)

OK, so I macerated blackberries with sweetener and added a little vanilla to the plain yogurt. it was delicious.

@marinelife Works for me.

Bananas and honey. ‘Nuff said. It doesn’t get much better than that.