Creamy labneh is perfect for breakfast
San Francisco Chronicle
Janet Fletcher, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, November 17, 2006
If you drain yogurt in a cheesecloth-lined sieve for several hours,
you have labneh, a creamy yogurt cheese eaten throughout the Eastern
Mediterranean and Middle East. The word is transliterated from the
Arabic in many ways — as lebni, labne and labna, for starters — but
all spellings refer to essentially the same product. Although you can
prepare labneh easily at home from your favorite yogurt, many people
apparently can’t be bothered, as packaged labneh is widely available
in the Bay Area’s Middle Eastern markets.
Labneh is made just like yogurt, by culturing milk with bacteria. Some
producers add cream or nonfat milk solids to the milk. The former
adds richness; the latter adds protein without adding fat. Some
add pectin or other stabilizers, and some add salt. In any case,
labneh is always thicker than yogurt because some of the whey has
been removed. Although the consistency varies slightly from one
manufacturer to another, you can expect labneh to be closer to sour
cream or soft cream cheese than to custard-like American yogurt.
Byblos, a popular brand made in the United States, has a pronounced
sour tang. The Pinar brand, which appears to be a Turkish import,
is salty, nutty, and more mellow, similar to thick creme fraiche. I
like them both.
In Lebanon, Armenia, Turkey and the other countries that ring
the Eastern Mediterranean, labneh is breakfast food. It will be
slathered on a flat plate, drizzled with extra-virgin olive oil, and
sprinkled with dried mint or za’atar, a seasoning blend. Flatbread,
olives, cucumbers and tomatoes are its usual companions, even at
breakfast. You can make a dramatic meze, or Mediterranean appetizer
course, by surrounding olive oil-dressed labneh with flatbread (pita,
lavash or the like), olives, scallions, radishes, whole mint leaves and
sprigs of fresh dill. Invite guests to tear off a piece of flatbread,
spread it with labneh, tuck in a few fresh herbs of their choice and
a length of scallion, and then fold it and eat it like a taco.
Delicious.
You can use labneh in dips in place of sour cream, or layer it with
honey and plumped dried fruit and toasted almonds for dessert. In an
appetizer context, a lean, high-acid white wine, such as an unoaked
Sauvignon Blanc, would be an ideal companion.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
